El
loc · Latin script
Meaning, in English: The name of the Latin-script letter L/l
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
El is a name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Morocco than in any other country, where it is the 15th most common surname.
- MAMorocco≈1 in 18(inferred from the name graph)
- SYSyria≈1 in 35
- EGEgypt≈1 in 204
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- Morocco (inferred from the name graph)
- Sources
- 343 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 18 (inferred from the name graph)
≈2,000,000 people, est.
Highest-authority source
Morocco, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
Locally spelled Êl in FR France and Él in EH Western Sahara.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
Orthographic variation im Auslaut: ss vs. ß nach Konsonant; 15+92 Belege.
Sources 1
- Deutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 2: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen II, Konsonantismus
Attested across 12 languages in the etymology graph.
How El is read(measured from records)
El is one spelling over 3 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 2 of them. Each row is what a source recorded for that language, beside the share of this name’s records the language holds. No single row is the name’s meaning.
- English38%
The name of the Latin-script letter L/l.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
- Spanish8.3%
masculine singular definite article; the
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
- Arabic6.7%
No dictionary in our sources glosses El in Arabic.
The share is ours — how much of this name’s records each language holds. The sense beside it is the source’s, quoted and credited, including where it names a gender. We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.
Where in the world(measured from records)
El counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.
Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MA Morocco | #15 | ≈2,000,000 est. | ≈1 in 18 | — | El | 196 |
| SY Syria | — | ≈550,000 est. | ≈1 in 35 | — | El | 26 |
| EG Egypt | #699 | ≈510,000 est. | ≈1 in 204 | — | El | 191 |
| FR France | — | ≈200,000 est. | ≈1 in 343 | 3.3K | Êl | 5 |
| DZ Algeria | #118 | ≈73,000 est. | ≈1 in 588 | — | El | 82 |
| LB Lebanon | — | ≈18,000 est. | ≈1 in 308 | — | El | 122 |
| EH Western Sahara | #9 | ≈2,100 est. | ≈1 in 314 | — | Él | 8 |
| AR Argentina | — | 1,683 | 1 in 27K | 1.7K | — | 2 |
Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.
Registers cited: INSEE — Fichier des prénoms (1900–2024); RENAPER — Apellidos (person counts, national). Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).
Other recorded senses(measured from records)
El is also recorded in 4 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In German, Orthographic variation im Auslaut: ss vs. ß nach Konsonant; 15+92 Belege.
as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 2: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen II, Konsonantismus
In Russian, 6 (19) juin, 14 (27) juin, 23 octobre (5 novembre). Elisée est son équivalent français. Fête : 14 juin.
as a nameRussian Names
In Russian, 13 (26) janvier, 1 (14) août. Eléazar est son équivalent français. Fête : 23 août.
as a nameRussian Names
In Russian, Anouchka, Sacha, Léna, Lisa, Natacha, Sonia, Nadia, Tania, Katia.
as a nameRussian Names
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- El Hedi ben Salemb. 1935MAMoroccan actor (1935-1976)
- El Anatsuib. 1944GHGhanaian painter and sculptor (born 1944)
- Alaa S Abd-El-Azizb. 1959researcher
- Shalev Ad-Elb. 1968ILIsraeli harpsichordist and conductor
- El Ritschib. 1969CHSwiss singer-songwriter
- Mabrouk El Mechrib. 1976FRFrench actor, film director and screenwriter
- Layla Elb. 1977GBBritish professional wrestler, dancer, and model
- May el-Toukhyb. 1977DKDanish film director and screenwriter
- Wassim El Bannab. 1979LBDanish footballer
- El Frauenfelderb. 1979CHSwiss painter
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 60 sources across 36 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AR Argentina | RENAPER — Apellidos (person counts, national) | — | 1.7K | — |
Reference works 5
- Wikipedia given-name tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
- Rymut, Słownik nazwisk współcześnie w Polsce używanych (10 vols, IJP PAN, Kraków 1992–1994) — every Polish surname in the PESEL register at the end of 1990, with bearer counts nationally and per voivodeship1990
- Ismlar.com — Uzbek given-name dictionary (meanings, gender, origin)
- Kotík, Antonín, Naše příjmení (nové vydání, 1897)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- Where does the name El come from?
- Orthographic variation im Auslaut: ss vs. ß nach Konsonant; 15+92 Belege. Recorded by Deutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 2: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen II, Konsonantismus.
- What does the name El mean?
- In English, The name of the Latin-script letter L/l.
- In which country does El have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 2.0 million people named El in Morocco, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled el.
- How common is the name El?
- In Argentina, the national register counted 1,683 people named El, about 1 in 27 thousand residents.
- How common is El compared with other names?
- In Morocco, El is the 15th most common surname of 211,124 surnames recorded there.
What do you want to know about El?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/elThe payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), which returns what this page shows everyone; the full country table, every register citation and the year-by-year series come with a licensed key, as does bulk access.
About this data
measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated
These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “El” — the 15th most common surname in Morocco. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.