Eliah
A variant of Elijah, a Hebrew name meaning "Yahweh is God".
Name Census estimates that about 1,555 living Americans carry the first name Eliah. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 71.2% of registrations being male. The average person named Eliah today is around 16 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Eliah births was 2016 (78 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Eliah. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Eliah with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Eliah is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 16 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
1.6K
~ 1 in 220,421 Americans
Peak year
2016
78 babies that year
Average age
16
years old
2024 SSA rank
#3,530
Tracked since 1972
Census
Eliah in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 1,327 people with the first name Eliah, which placed it at #10,155 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#10,155
National first-name rank
People counted
1.3K
1,327 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
38.4% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Eliah
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Eliah is White at 38.4%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (33.6%) and Black (13.7%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Eliah described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Eliah at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White38.4% · 509
- Hispanic or Latino33.6% · 446
- Black or African American13.7% · 182
- Two or more races7.8% · 104
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.8% · 50
- American Indian and Alaska Native2.7% · 36
Gender
Gender distribution for Eliah
Eliah is one of the more evenly split names in the SSA data. Of the 1,576 total registrations, 1,122 (71.2%) were male and 454 (28.8%) were female.
Eliah as a male name
- Ranked #3,530 in 2024
- 32 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2009 (56 births)
Eliah as a female name
- Ranked #7,316 in 2024
- 15 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2016 (27 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Eliah on both sides of the split. Of the 1,324 people counted with this name, 952 were male (71.9%) and 372 were female (28.1%).
Popularity
Eliah: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Eliah from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 639 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Eliah remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Eliah by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Eliah during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Eliahs live
The SSA's state-level files cover 5 states and territories. California, Texas, Florida recorded the most babies named Eliah, while Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Florida recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 59 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Eliah
The name Eliah is a variant spelling of the Hebrew name Elijah, which has its origins in the Old Testament. The name Elijah is derived from the combination of two Hebrew words: "El," meaning "God," and "Yah," which is a shortened form of the name Yahweh, the Hebrew name for God. Thus, the name Elijah can be interpreted to mean "my God is Yahweh" or "Yahweh is God."
Elijah was a prominent prophet in the Hebrew Bible, known for his devotion to God and his confrontation with the pagan prophets of Baal. The biblical account of Elijah's life is found primarily in the books of 1 Kings and 2 Kings, where he is depicted as a powerful and fearless messenger of God, performing miracles and calling the Israelites back to the worship of Yahweh.
One of the earliest recorded examples of the name Elijah can be found in the Hebrew Bible, referring to the biblical prophet himself. The name Elijah or its variants, such as Elias or Eliah, have been used throughout history by various cultures and religions that have been influenced by the Judeo-Christian tradition.
Historically, there have been several notable individuals who bore the name Eliah or its variants. Elias Hicks (1748-1830) was an American Quaker minister and leader of the Hicksite Separation, a schism within the Religious Society of Friends. Elias Lönnrot (1802-1884) was a Finnish philologist and collector of traditional Finnish oral poetry, best known for compiling the Kalevala, the national epic of Finland.
In the 20th century, Elijah Muhammad (1897-1975), born Elijah Poole, was an African American religious leader who led the Nation of Islam from 1934 until his death in 1975. Elijah Wald (born 1959) is an American writer, musician, and scholar known for his work on blues and folk music.
Another notable figure was Elias Canetti (1905-1994), a Bulgarian-born novelist, playwright, and non-fiction writer who won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1981. His works often explored the relationship between the individual and society, and he is particularly known for his novel "Auto-da-Fé" and his non-fiction work "Crowds and Power."
These are just a few examples of individuals throughout history who have borne the name Eliah or its variants, reflecting the enduring influence of the biblical figure Elijah across various cultures and time periods.
People
Eliah + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Eliah as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with E
Other first names starting with E with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Eliah: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Eliah?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 1,555 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Eliah going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 220,421 US residents.
Is Eliah a common name?
We classify Eliah as "Rare". It ranks above 92.6% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 1,576 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Eliah most popular?
The single biggest year for Eliah was 2016, when 78 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Eliah is about 16 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Eliah in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 1,327 people with the name Eliah, or 0.44 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #10,155 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Eliah in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Eliah?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Eliah on both sides of the split. Of the 1,324 people counted with this name, 952 were male (71.9%) and 372 were female (28.1%). The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Eliah?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Eliah is White at 38.4%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (33.6%) and Black (13.7%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Eliah most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Eliah in the 2020 Census, accounting for 38.4% (509 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Eliah in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Eliah a male name?
Yes, 71.2% of people registered as Eliah in the SSA data are male. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Eliah still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Eliah in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Eliah can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How many people have Eliah as a first name?
For a quick modern take, check how many people share the name Eliah on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org.