Names
Every Hebrew name Israelis carry, and what each one means
3,104 names from the Bible, from nature and from modern Hebrew: 1,812 for boys, 870 for girls, 422 used for both. Each has its Hebrew spelling and meaning, and 2,114 have the number of Israelis who carry it, from the national register.
Names listed
3,104
1,812 boys, 870 girls, 422 both
From the Bible
1,604
names borne by people in the Hebrew Bible
From nature
480
flowers, trees, animals, water, sky and stone
Most carried
David
98,085 Jewish Israelis born since 1949
The list
Search by name, by meaning or by theme
Type light, water, lion or tree and see what comes back, or pick a theme: the Bible, flowers, animals, places in Israel. Tap any name for its origin, its gematria and how many Israelis carry it, year by year.
Showing the 60 most carried names while the other 3,044 load.
By theme
Modern Hebrew names are mostly nouns you can point at
The language revival reached for the land and the elements: dew, wave, almond, cyclamen, ibex, flint. 480 names here come from nature alone. Tap a theme to open it in the list.
Over 75 years
Biblical names fell from 51.6% of Jewish births in 1949 to 37.7% in 1974, and are back to 49.9%
Names from nature tell the other half of the story: 8.6% of the 1949 births carry one, 24.3% at their height in 1974, and 20.3% in 2024. Shares are of every Jewish Israeli in the register born that year, under the name they carry today.
The register
The most common names in Israel right now
Published by the Population and Immigration Authority in January 2026, for babies born in 2025. The country-wide list covers every birth in Israel; the Authority reports the Jewish sector separately, and the two look genuinely different. Only the top three of each Jewish-sector list are published, so only those are shown.
Boys, all of Israel
- 1Mohammed
- 2Yosef
- 3Adam
- 4Ariel
- 5David
- 6Lavie
- 7Rafael
- 8Omer
- 9Eitan
- 10Michael
Boys, Jewish sector (top three)
- 1Ariel
- 2Lavie
- 3David
Girls, all of Israel
- 1Avigail
- 2Miriam
- 3Libi
- 4Tamar
- 5Lia
- 6Sara
- 7Yael
- 8Ella
- 9Ayala
- 10Noa
Girls, Jewish sector (top three)
- 1Avigail
- 2Miriam
- 3Libi
Source: Israel Population and Immigration Authority, published January 2026, for babies born in 2025.
Custom
How Israeli naming actually works
Ashkenazi families traditionally name after a relative who has died, as a way of carrying the name forward. Sephardi and Mizrahi families frequently name after living grandparents, which is why the same names recur every second generation rather than every third. Neither is a rule, and plenty of Israeli families now do neither.
Modern Hebrew names come overwhelmingly from nature and light: dew, wave, lake, oak, dawn, radiance. That is a deliberate legacy of the language revival, which reached for the land and the elements rather than for the shtetl. Biblical names never went away, but they now sit alongside a whole vocabulary of names that did not exist in 1900.
One practical note for anyone making aliyah: your Hebrew name goes on your teudat zehut, and choosing a spelling is a decision you make once. Two spellings of the same name can carry different gematria and different pronunciation cues, so it is worth five minutes rather than five seconds.
A to Z
Every name is also listed A to Z, one page per letter
The whole library in alphabetical order, with each name's Hebrew, meaning and origin, for reading straight through rather than searching.
Keep going
Next
Four pages that start where this one stops.
Frequently asked questions
How many Hebrew names are there?+
This library holds 3,104. 2,114 of them are carried by Jewish Israelis in the Central Bureau of Statistics register, which lists every first name with at least five carriers born since 1949; the rest are personal names from the Hebrew Bible and rarer nature, sage, Yiddish and Sephardi names. Names from other languages are left out unless at least 300 Israelis born since 2000 carry them.
What is the difference between a Hebrew name and a Jewish name?+
In practice, none for most people: a Jewish name usually means the Hebrew name used for religious purposes, such as being called to the Torah or on a ketubah. Many Jews outside Israel carry a secular name and a Hebrew name that are unrelated, like Michael and Moshe.
Why are so many Israeli names unisex?+
Modern Hebrew revived and invented names from nature words and abstract nouns, and those carry no grammatical gender attachment in practice. Names like Tal (dew), Shai (gift), Ariel and Gal are given to boys and girls freely: 422 names here are carried by at least one person of the other sex in every ten.
What are the most popular baby names in Israel?+
On the Population and Immigration Authority's list for babies born in 2025, published in January 2026, Mohammed leads the country-wide boys' list, followed by Yosef and Adam. Within the Jewish sector the top three are Ariel, Lavie and David. Avigail leads the girls' list on both counts, followed by Miriam and Libi. The country-wide list covers every birth in Israel, which is why it looks different from the Jewish-sector one.
Why is Lavie suddenly everywhere?+
Lavie means lion. It took first place among Jewish boys in the Authority's September 2025 release, which Israeli reporting linked to Operation Rising Lion, Am Ke'Lavie in Hebrew, and it held second place behind Ariel in the January 2026 release. Israeli naming reliably tracks the national mood: the same effect shows up after every major event.
How do I find my Hebrew name?+
If you were given one at a brit or baby naming, it is on your ketubah or your parents' records and it usually takes the form [name] ben [father] or [name] bat [father]. If you were not given one, choosing one is entirely normal, and many people do it before an aliyah or a bar or bat mitzvah.
What is the gematria of a name?+
Every Hebrew letter is also a number, so every name adds up to a total. It carries no legal or halachic weight, but it is a long-standing tradition to look at it, and some people choose between two spellings on that basis. Each name here shows its total.