Elka
Elka was given to 10 girls in 2025, #9,631 among girls’ names; 725 Americans have been recorded with it since 1943 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Elka by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Elka?
#9,631 among girls’ names, 2025
Elka fell from #6,093 in 2015 to #9,631 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born fell from 11.8 to 6.2 per million.
21 babies in 2015, the peak
Elka peaked in 2015, when 21 girls were given it, #6,093 among girls’ names. The 10 births of 2025 are 48% of that peak.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 10 | #9,631 | 6.2 |
| 2024 | 17 | #6,714 | 10.5 |
| 2023 | 15 | #7,356 | 9.3 |
| 2022 | 13 | #8,162 | 7.9 |
| 2021 | 19 | #6,244 | 11.6 |
| 2020 | 15 | #7,312 | 9.3 |
| 2019 | 13 | #8,251 | 7.7 |
| 2018 | 18 | #6,597 | 10.6 |
| 2017 | 20 | #6,110 | 11.6 |
| 2016 | 21 | #6,030 | 11.9 |
Every recorded year (60)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 21 | #6,093 | 11.8 |
| 2014 | 19 | #6,521 | 10.6 |
| 2013 | 11 | #9,776 | 6.3 |
| 2012 | 9 | #11,545 | 5.1 |
| 2011 | 11 | #9,917 | 6.3 |
| 2010 | 18 | #6,999 | 10.1 |
| 2009 | 13 | #9,045 | 7.1 |
| 2008 | 14 | #8,655 | 7.4 |
| 2007 | 14 | #8,661 | 7.3 |
| 2006 | 18 | #6,942 | 9.5 |
| 2005 | 9 | #11,165 | 4.9 |
| 2004 | 11 | #9,438 | 6.0 |
| 2003 | 17 | #6,678 | 9.3 |
| 2002 | 13 | #7,958 | 7.2 |
| 2001 | 10 | #9,587 | 5.6 |
| 2000 | 8 | #11,031 | 4.4 |
| 1999 | 12 | #7,867 | 6.8 |
| 1998 | 10 | #8,784 | 5.7 |
| 1997 | 7 | #11,187 | 4.0 |
| 1996 | 12 | #7,274 | 6.8 |
| 1995 | 9 | #8,980 | 5.1 |
| 1992 | 8 | #9,744 | 4.3 |
| 1991 | 9 | #8,799 | 4.8 |
| 1990 | 13 | #6,574 | 6.8 |
| 1988 | 8 | #8,620 | 4.5 |
| 1987 | 7 | #9,051 | 4.0 |
| 1986 | 8 | #7,951 | 4.7 |
| 1983 | 9 | #6,869 | 5.4 |
| 1982 | 12 | #5,638 | 7.1 |
| 1981 | 7 | #8,373 | 4.2 |
| 1980 | 9 | #6,947 | 5.4 |
| 1979 | 5 | #10,647 | 3.1 |
| 1978 | 11 | #5,662 | 7.2 |
| 1977 | 14 | #4,722 | 9.1 |
| 1976 | 13 | #4,697 | 8.9 |
| 1975 | 9 | #6,102 | 6.2 |
| 1974 | 14 | #4,294 | 9.5 |
| 1973 | 16 | #3,832 | 11.0 |
| 1972 | 17 | #3,598 | 11.2 |
| 1971 | 10 | #5,222 | 6.0 |
| 1970 | 12 | #4,572 | 6.9 |
| 1969 | 17 | #3,361 | 10.1 |
| 1968 | 11 | #4,282 | 6.7 |
| 1967 | 14 | #3,526 | 8.5 |
| 1966 | 12 | #3,794 | 7.1 |
| 1965 | 7 | #5,443 | 4.0 |
| 1964 | 8 | #5,144 | 4.2 |
| 1961 | 5 | #6,838 | 2.5 |
| 1952 | 8 | #4,230 | 4.3 |
| 1943 | 5 | #4,870 | 3.6 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Elka a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Elka has been recorded only for girls: SSA lists no boys with the name in 60 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Elka: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Elka, and how old are they?
An estimated 699 Americans named Elka and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (96% of everyone recorded); the median is 24 years old and half are between 11 and 48. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 932 people named Elka (924 women and girls, 8 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 621 born in the U.S. The Census count is 1.5 times that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census counts people born abroad, whom SSA’s files leave out, and it records the name people give, which SSA may have recorded under another spelling or as part of a compound name.
Living estimate: SSA births carried forward with the survival rates in SSA’s cohort life tables (2024 Trustees Report) for each birth year and sex. How the estimate is made. Count: Census Bureau, first names in the 2020 Census (released April 14, 2026; names reported 100 or more times, with the Bureau’s disclosure-avoidance adjustment).
Where are babies named Elka born?
| State | Since 1910 | Rank, girls | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|
| New York | 186 | not ranked | 3.7× |
| New Jersey | 10 | not ranked | 0.5× |
Where Elka is more common than its national share predicts
Relative to its national share, Elka is most over-represented in New York: since 1943 it was given 3.7 times as often there as its national share each year would predict.
States: SSA state file, 1910-2025, published May 8, 2026; births count girls and boys together, and the rank is among girls’ names in the state in 2025. The file leaves out any state and year with fewer than 5 babies of the name, so small states are undercounted; each ratio compares the state’s births of Elka with the births its national share predicts year by year, for states with at least 100 births of the name.
Names spelled alike
Of these 5 names spelled alike, given to 2,537 babies since 1880, Elka is the second most given (29% of them). In 2025 it was given to 10 of their 32 babies (31%), the most given that year.
Spelled alike: names in the SSA national file with the same pattern of letters and sounds and at most two letters apart, and Wiktionary’s listed forms; births since 1880 and in 2025, and each name’s peak year, from the SSA national file, published May 8, 2026. Some are separate names, not spellings of one.
Names that rose and fell in the same decades as Elka
Names whose births rose and fell across the same decades, measured on each decade’s share of births.
Similar histories: each decade’s share of births, from the SSA national file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
More about Elka and names like it
- Compare Elka and ElkeBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2010sElka peaked in 2015.
- New York’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Elka since 1910.
- The top names of 2015The year the most babies were named Elka.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Elka alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with EMost given first.