Entry № 2922 · Germanic origin

Elsa Elsa — Meaning, Origin & Baby Name Popularity

/ EL-sah /
Gender
Girl
Origin
Germanic
Meaning
"Pledged to God"
Syllables
2
First recorded
Medieval (Germanic)

A name that means "pledged to god".

Elsa is the German short form of Elisabeth — from the Hebrew Elisheba, meaning "my God is an oath." The name has been used across Germanic Europe for centuries.

Elsa rose dramatically in the U.S. after Disney's Frozen (2013), in which the Snow Queen Elsa is the central character. Today it sits in the U.S. top 200.

Pledged to God. The Snow Queen of Frozen.

The name in its native script.

Elsa
Transliteration
Elsa
Pronunciation
/ ˈɛl.sə /
Root
Grammatical form

Where Elsa stands.

Elsa does not currently appear in the US Social Security Administration's top 1,000 girls' names, so we don't publish a US rank or birth count for it. That says nothing about the name's standing elsewhere in the world — only that it sits outside the ranked US data we rely on.

Elsas before her.

Real people
Elsa Schiaparelli
Italian fashion designer.
1890 – 1973
Elsa Pataky
Spanish actress.
born 1976
In fiction
Elsa
Snow Queen in Disney's Frozen.
2013 film

Names connected to Elsa.

The number behind Elsa.

1

The Leader

In Pythagorean numerology the letters of Elsa reduce to 1, The Leader. This is a traditional interpretive system, not a factual claim about the name.