FastNamesElijah
Hebrew name meaning "Derived from biblical Hebrew Eliyyahu (אֱלִיָּהוּ), compound of Eli ('my God') and Yah (the Tetragrammaton), signifying 'my God is Yahweh'.". Ranked 7th for boys in 2025.
Meaning and origin of Elijah
Derived from biblical Hebrew Eliyyahu (אֱלִיָּהוּ), compound of Eli ('my God') and Yah (the Tetragrammaton), signifying 'my God is Yahweh'.
Linguistically, Elijah is classified under Hebrew naming traditions. It is typically pronounced "ih-LY-juh".
Popularity and ranking
In official US Social Security birth records from 1880 through 2025, Elijah has been given to a total of 380,611 boys. It has also been given to 1,304 girls.
Peak year: Elijah reached its highest relative share among boys in 2020, when 13,238 babies received the name (7,669 per million births).
All-time best rank: 4th place, first achieved in 2020.
Recent standing (2025): Ranked 7th with 11,111 births. Ten years earlier in 2015, it ranked 11th (up 4 spots).
Busiest decade: More boys were named Elijah in the 2010s than in any other decade (137,147 births).
| Decade | Recorded births |
|---|---|
| 1880s | 856 |
| 1890s | 704 |
| 1900s | 725 |
| 1910s | 1,963 |
| 1920s | 2,755 |
| 1930s | 2,135 |
| 1940s | 2,399 |
| 1950s | 2,314 |
| 1960s | 1,524 |
| 1970s | 3,400 |
| 1980s | 7,567 |
| 1990s | 34,652 |
| 2000s | 110,421 |
| 2010s | 137,147 |
| 2020s | 72,049 |
Source: Social Security Administration, national baby name data, data through 2025. Names given to fewer than five babies of one sex in a year aren't published, so totals are a little lower than actual births.
Where Elijah is most common in the US
Accounting for when Elijah was in fashion nationally, it has been most heavily concentrated in the following states (measured against the expected rate from each state's births):
- Hawaii: 1.9 times the national rate (1,909 births since 1910).
- New Mexico: 1.7 times the national rate (3,439 births since 1910).
- South Carolina: 1.6 times the national rate (7,853 births since 1910).
- Mississippi: 1.6 times the national rate (5,075 births since 1910).
- Alaska: 1.5 times the national rate (1,036 births since 1910).
Source: Social Security Administration, baby names by state, data through 2025. Names given to fewer than five babies of one sex in a state in a year aren't published, so totals are a little lower than actual births.
How many people have the name Elijah?
About 365,000 living American boys and men share the name Elijah. Additionally, an estimated 1,300 living American girls and women share the name.
The median age of an American named Elijah is 15 years old.
Estimated from Social Security Administration records (1880–2025) and official SSA cohort mortality tables.
History of the name Elijah
Elijah originates in the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) as the name of the renowned ninth-century BCE northern kingdom prophet whose narrative dominates the Books of Kings. Elijah boldly defended Yahwistic monotheism against the worship of the Phoenician storm god Baal promoted by King Ahab and Queen Jezebel, triumphing in the famous contest on Mount Carmel. Biblical tradition recounts that Elijah did not experience physical death, but was caught up to heaven in a whirlwind by a chariot and horses of fire, cementing his position as the expected herald of the Messianic age.
Although prominent in Jewish Haggadah and Christian gospel typology (where John the Baptist was associated with the spirit of Elijah), the name was relatively rare as an English baptismal name during the Middle Ages, with parents generally preferring the Latinate Hellenized form Elias. Following the English Reformation, Puritans systematically revived authentic Old Testament forms, establishing Elijah in British and early American colonial parish registers.
In United States demographic history, Elijah was a respected colonial and frontier staple that receded to moderate frequency in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Beginning in the 1990s, however, Elijah initiated one of the most remarkable resurgences in modern naming records. Propelled by parents seeking deep biblical resonance combined with a gentle, vowel-ended cadence, Elijah ascended into the national top ten in 2016 and reached rank 4 in 2020 and 2021, recording tens of thousands of births each year.
Notable people named Elijah
- Elijah Wood (1981–), American actor
- Elijah McCoy (1844–1929), Canadian-American inventor and engineer
- Elijah Muhammad (1897–1975), American religious leader and mentor to Malcolm X
- Elijah Cummings (1951–2019), American politician and civil rights advocate
Variants and related names
Spelling variants
Diminutives and nicknames
Related names
Sources and references
- Patrick Hanks, Kate Hardcastle, Flavia Hodges. A Dictionary of First Names (2006), p. 87.
- E. G. Withycombe. The Oxford Dictionary of English Christian Names (1977), p. 98.
- Francis Brown, S. R. Driver, Charles A. Briggs. A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), p. 45.