Elijah
A masculine Hebrew name meaning "my God is Yahweh/Jehovah".
Our analysis of Social Security Administration records puts the number of living Americans named Elijah at approximately 355,934. That places it at #8 in the national ranking of first names. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Elijah today is around 17 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Elijah births was 2011 (14,030 babies). In terms of living bearers, it sits close to Keith (354,908).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Elijah. 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 Elijah with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Elijah is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 1,289 girls registered with the name since 1880.
- • Elijah is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 17 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
356K
~ 1 in 963 Americans
Peak year
2011
14,030 babies that year
Average age
17
years old
2024 SSA rank
#8
Tracked since 1880
Census
Elijah in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 252,755 people with the first name Elijah, which placed it at #216 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
#216
National first-name rank
People counted
253K
252,755 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
83.7
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
42.5% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Elijah
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Elijah is White at 42.5%. The next largest groups are Black (23.5%) and Hispanic (21.0%). 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 Elijah 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 Elijah at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White42.5% · 107,342
- Black or African American23.5% · 59,488
- Hispanic or Latino21.0% · 53,112
- Two or more races9.6% · 24,168
- Asian and Pacific Islander2.5% · 6,268
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.9% · 2,377
Gender
Gender distribution for Elijah
Out of the 370,593 babies given the name Elijah since 1880, 99.7% were registered as male. The name sits firmly on the male side of the spectrum, with only a handful of female registrations across the entire dataset.
Elijah as a male name
- Ranked #8 in 2024
- 11,171 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2011 (13,997 births)
Elijah as a female name
- Ranked #5,044 in 2024
- 26 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2004 (77 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Elijah appears almost entirely male. Of the 252,751 people counted with this name, 99.6% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Elijah: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Elijah from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 137,406 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Elijah remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Elijah 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 Elijah during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Elijahs live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. California, Texas, Florida recorded the most babies named Elijah, while Vermont, Wyoming, Montana recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 7,152 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Elijah
The name Elijah is a Hebrew name derived from the elements "El" meaning "God" and "Yah" which is a shortened form of the Hebrew name for God, Yahweh or Jehovah. It is believed to mean "Yahweh is God" or "My God is Yahweh". The name can be traced back to the 9th century BCE and the biblical prophet Elijah from the northern kingdom of Israel.
The prophet Elijah is a significant figure in the Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, the Quran, and the Baha'i writings. He is venerated in Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and the Baha'i Faith. In the Bible, Elijah is described as a hairy man who lived in the wilderness and worked miracles such as raising the dead, bringing fire down from the sky, and being taken up to heaven by a whirlwind in a chariot of fire.
One of the earliest recorded examples of the name Elijah is the biblical prophet himself, who lived during the reign of Ahab in the 9th century BCE. Other notable individuals named Elijah include Elijah ben Solomon, a Jewish Talmudic scholar from the 12th century CE, and Elijah of Vilna, a prominent rabbi and Jewish leader from the 18th century CE (1720-1797).
Throughout history, several influential people have borne the name Elijah. Elijah Craig (1738-1808) was an American Baptist minister and entrepreneurial distiller credited with being the first to mature bourbon in charred oak casks. Elijah Lovejoy (1802-1837) was an American Presbyterian minister, anti-slavery reformer, and journalist who was killed by a pro-slavery mob for his abolitionist views.
Elijah Muhammad (1897-1975) was a prominent African-American religious leader who led the Nation of Islam from 1934 until his death in 1975. Elijah Jeremiah McCoy (1844-1929), known as the "Real McCoy", was an African-American inventor and engineer who patented several important industrial inventions, including an automatic lubricator for steam engines.
Elijah Ricks (1982-present) is an American entrepreneur and investor who co-founded the venture capital firm Mucker Capital and the online education platform Semetric. These are just a few examples of notable individuals named Elijah throughout history, reflecting the enduring popularity and significance of this Hebrew name.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Elijah
People
Elijah + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Elijah 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
Elijah: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Elijah?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 355,934 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Elijah 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 963 US residents.
Is Elijah a common name?
We classify Elijah as "Common". It ranks above 99.9% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 370,593 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Elijah most popular?
The single biggest year for Elijah was 2011, when 14,030 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Elijah is about 17 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Elijah in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 252,755 people with the name Elijah, or 83.69 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #216 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 Elijah 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 Elijah?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Elijah appears almost entirely male. Of the 252,751 people counted with this name, 99.6% were male and only a very small share were female. 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 Elijah?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Elijah is White at 42.5%. The next largest groups are Black (23.5%) and Hispanic (21.0%). 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 Elijah most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Elijah in the 2020 Census, accounting for 42.5% (107,342 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 Elijah in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Elijah a male name?
Yes, 99.7% of people registered as Elijah 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 Elijah still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Elijah 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 Elijah 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 the name Elijah?
For a quick modern take, check how many Americans are named Elijah on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org.