Eli (name)

Eli as a name has two different meanings, both originating in the Hebrew Bible.

Eli can be used for males (Hebrew tradition) or females (Scandanavian tradition). Hebrew origin, from Biblical עֵלִי "ascent", spelled with the Hebrew letter ayin in the beginning, the name of Eli, the high priest in the Books of Samuel. It is identical to the Arabic name Ali (علي). It came to be used as a given name among the Puritans in the 17th century and was by them taken to the American colonies.

Eli may alternatively be an unrelated abbreviation of Hebrew names such as Elijah, Elias, Elisha, Eliezer, Elimelech, etc., all containing the element אלי, meaning "my God" and spelled with the Hebrew letter aleph in the beginning. El is the name of a Semitic deity that is used in the Bible as a name for the god of the Israelites, and -i is the suffix for the genitive form ("mine").

In the United States, the popularity of the given name Eli was hovering around rank 200 in the 1880s. It declined gradually during the late 19th and early-to-mid 20th centuries, falling below rank 700 in 1964. In a significant revival of the name's popularity in the early 1970s, it bounced back above rank 400 in 1976. Its popularity has continued to grow since then, entering the top 100 masculine given names in the 2000s, and ranking as the 64th most popular boys' name as of 2021.

Eli is also a short form of names Elisabet, Elin, and Helena in Scandinavia, unrelated to the masculine Hebrew name Eli. The two names differ in pronunciation as well.

Biblical given name עֵלִי ("ascent")

 * Eli Abaev (born 1998), American-Israeli basketball player
 * Eli Bebout (born 1946), Wyoming politician
 * Eli Beeding (1928-2013), US Air Force captain and rocket test subject
 * Eli Whitney Blake (1795–1886), American inventor
 * Eli Whitney Blake Jr. (1836–1895), American scientist
 * Eli Broad (1933–2021), American billionaire, philanthropist, art collector
 * Eli Metcalfe Bruce (1828–1866), philanthropist, financier and politician from Kentucky
 * Eli Franklin Burton (1879–1948), Canadian physicist
 * Eli Giannini (born 1956), female Australian architect and director of MGS Architects in Melbourne
 * Eli Heckscher (1879–1952), Swedish economist
 * Eli Jones Henkle (1825–1893), U.S. Congressman from Maryland
 * Eli H. Janney (1831–1912), engineer, Confederate soldier
 * Eli Langer (born 1967), Canadian artist
 * Eli Lilly (1838–1898), American soldier, pharmaceutical chemist, and industrialist, founder of Eli Lilly and Company
 * Eli Lilly (industrialist) (1885–1977), American industrialist, grandson of the Colonel
 * Eli Long (1837–1903), General in the Union Army in the American Civil War
 * Eli Mohar (1948–2006), Israeli songwriter and columnist
 * Eli M. Oboler (1915–1983), librarian, Idaho State University and writer
 * Eli Pemberton (born 1997), American basketball player in the Israeli Basketball Premier League
 * Eli Thomas Reich (1913–1999), US vice admiral
 * Eli Salzberger (born 1960), Israeli legal scholar
 * Eli Saulsbury (1817–1893), U.S. Senator from Delaware
 * Eli Schenkel (born 1992), Canadian Olympic fencer
 * Eli C. D. Shortridge (1830–1908), Governor of North Dakota
 * Eli Siegel (1902–1978), Latvian-American poet, critic and philosopher
 * Eli Snyman (born 1996), Zimbabwe-born South African rugby union player
 * Eli Soriano (1947-2021), televangelist from the Philippines
 * Eli Todd Tappan (1824–1888), American educator, mathematician, author, lawyer and newspaper editor
 * Eli Terry (1772–1852), inventor and clockmaker in Connecticut
 * Eli Thayer (1819–1899), member of the US House of Representatives from Massachusetts
 * Eli Todd (1769–1833), pioneer in the treatment of the mentally ill in Connecticut
 * Eli Velder (1925–2020), American academic
 * Eli Walker (born 1992), Welsh rugby union player
 * Eli L. Whiteley (1913–1986), American awarded the Medal of Honor
 * Eli Whitney (1765–1825), American inventor of the cotton gin
 * Eli Erlick (born 1995), American activist

Hebrew name אלי ("my God") or names of which that is a short form

 * Eli Cohen (disambiguation), multiple people


 * Eli Amir (אלי עמיר born 1937), Israeli writer and peace activist
 * Eli Biham (אלי ביהם, born 1960), Israeli cryptographer
 * Eli M. Black (Elihu) (1921–1975), American businessman
 * Eli Cohen (footballer, born 1951), Israeli soccer player and manager
 * Eli Dasa (born 1992), Israeli footballer for Dynamo Moscow and the Israel national team
 * Eli Dershwitz (born 1995), 2023 World Saber Champion, 2015 Under-20 World Saber Champion, U.S. Olympic saber fencer
 * Eli Gorenstein (born 1952), Israeli actor, voice actor, singer and cellist
 * Eli Hurvitz (Elihu, 1932-2011), Israeli industrialist
 * Eli Manning (Elisha) (born 1981), American football player, 2-time super bowl MVP
 * Eli Morgan (born 1996), American baseball pitcher for the Cleveland Indians
 * Elie Munk (1900–1981), German-born French rabbi and rabbinic scholar
 * Eli Noam (born 1946), professor at Columbia University
 * Eli Ohana (אלי אוחנה, born 1964), Israeli football player and coach
 * Eli Ricks (born 2001), American football player
 * Eli Roth (born 1972), American film director
 * Eli Sherbatov (born 1991), Canadian-Israeli ice hockey player
 * Eli Wallach (1915–2014), movie actor
 * Elie Wiesel (אלי ויזל; Eliezer) (1928-2016), Romanian-born American human rights activist, Holocaust writer
 * Elihu Yale (1649–1721), benefactor of Yale University, also known as "Eli Yale"
 * Eli Yatzpan (born 1965), Israeli television host and comedian
 * Eli Yishai (אליהו "אלי" ישי, Eliyahu, born 1962), Israeli politician
 * Eli Zuckerman (born 1973), Israeli Olympic competitive sailor
 * Eli Wolf (born 1997), American football player

Fictional characters

 * Eli, on Freaks and Geeks
 * Eli, from Xena: Warrior Princess
 * Eli, the eponymous nomad from the 2009 film The Book of Eli
 * Eli, in the Swedish novel Let the Right One In
 * Eli Cash, in The Royal Tenenbaums
 * Eli Clark, a survivor in the video game Identity V
 * Eli Dingle, on the British soap Emmerdale
 * Eli Ever, in novels by V.E. Schwab
 * Eli Gemstone, on The Righteous Gemstones
 * Eli Gold, on The Good Wife
 * Eli Loker, on Lie to Me
 * Eli Mills, from the film Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom
 * Eli "Weevil" Navarro on Veronica Mars
 * Eli Shane, in Slugterra
 * Eli Stone, title character of the American show Eli Stone
 * Eli Sunday, in There Will Be Blood
 * Elias "Eli" Thompson, on the American television series Boardwalk Empire
 * Eli Vance, in the Half-Life video games
 * Eli Vanto, in the novel Star Wars: Thrawn
 * Eli Wallace, on Stargate Universe
 * Eli Watkins, in ''Oil!
 * Eli, known as Liquid Snake, from video game franchise Metal Gear Solid

Surname

 * Billy Eli (born 1962), American singer and songwriter
 * Look Tin Eli (1870-1919), Chinese-American businessman
 * Roger Eli (born 1965), English former footballer

Scandinavian given name
Eli in Scandinavia can also be written as Øli or Ellen.
 * Eli Arnstad (born 1962), Norwegian civil servant and politician
 * Eli Fischer-Jørgensen (1911-2010), Danish professor and member of the Danish resistance movement
 * Eli Kristiansen (born 1933), Norwegian politician
 * Eli Rygg (born 1955), Norwegian television personality
 * Eli Skolmen Ryg (born 1936), Norwegian television producer
 * Eli Sollied Øveraas (born 1949), Norwegian politician

Fictional characters

 * Eli Ayase, from the anime Love Live!
 * Eli James, a character from the Ghost Whisperer