Given name & surname
Khalil
“a beloved friend”
Khalil is a variant of Kahlil. One Arabic interpretation is “a beloved friend.”
Meaning & origin
What it means
Khalil is a variant of Kahlil. One Arabic interpretation is “a beloved friend.”
Explained through its name family
Where it comes from
An origin associated with this spelling is Arabic.
How it developed
From Arabic خَلِيل (“friend”); its root is Arabic خ ل ل.
Adapted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0)
The story
Published U.S. birth records include this spelling as early as 1957. This is the earliest published observation available here, rather than a date for the name’s origin.
From dated birth records
Khalil through the years
- Babies since 1880
- 25,203
- 25,021 boys · 182 girls
- Most popular year
- 2020
- 1,242 babies
- 2025
- 826
- #384 for boys
- 2021–25 vs 2016–20
- +6%
- Steady
Where it’s given
By the numbers
In 2025, this name appeared in 826 U.S. birth records for boys, ranking No. 384 among boys’ names. Average annual use for boys was 6.2% higher in 2021–2025 than in 2016–2020. In 2025, Texas had the largest reported state-level birth count for boys with this name (95). Published U.S. population figures for this spelling include 17,176 as a first name in 2020; 9,492 as a surname in 2020.
From Social Security birth records and U.S. Census name counts for this exact spelling. Other spellings are counted separately.
Khalil’s family of names
Khalil has a feminine form in Khalilah. Khalil has a related form in Kahlil. Khalil has a related form in Khaleel.
Inner ring: spellings · middle: nicknames and forms · outer: across languages.
Nicknames & forms 4
Diminutives, pet forms, short forms and variants used alongside the name.
Spellings & scripts 1
The same name written differently, including transliterations into other scripts.
Across languages 2
Equivalents and cognates in other languages, plus older forms it grew from.
People named Khalil
- Al-Khalil ibn Ahmad al-FarahidiIraqi lexicographer, philologist and poet (718 – 786 CE)
- Al-Ashraf KhalilSultan of Egypt and Syria (r. 1290–1293)1263–1293
- Khalil al-HayyaChairman of the Hamas Political Bureauborn 1960
- Khalil al-WazirPalestinian military leader, founder of Fatah (1935–1988)
- Khalil ChemmamTunisian association football playerborn 1987
- Khalil TahaLebanese wrestler (1932-2020)
- Khalil FongHong Kong singer (1983–2025)
- Khalil AyariTunisian association football playerborn 2005
- Khalil HaqqaniAfghan minister1966–2024
Listed by how widely each person is written about, which says nothing about the name itself.
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