Zachary or Elias for a baby boy?

[Eloise1995]

I am sorting out my son’s birth certificate tomorrow and we are still torn between these two names, which do you sway more towards and why not the other? We aren’t religious, but happy to use a name that is biblical. Fully English both his middle and surname is, but don’t mind the first name being from a different origin.

I love Zachary and know a couple but they both get called Zach. Would you be happy with it being shortened?

Absolutely love Elias. It’s timeless, not overused but not out there and liable to date. I like Zachary but not as much as Elias

Zachary

Elias or Ilias are beautiful. Elegant, glorious.

Zach- variants are fabulous but I'd go for something established but a bit less well used, personally.

Zachary is my favourite! I love it and also the nn Zac.

Elias is nice but the one in my daughter’s (secondary school) class gets shortened to Eli (which I like) but some teachers mistakenly called him Ellie in year 7 and it’s unfortunately stuck!

I don't like the Zach spelling but Zac is nice.
Elias (El-eye-as) is a bit of a mouthful, and I don't like Eli.

Which name (and diminutive) goes best with the surname?

I prefer Zachary, out of the two. I really like the shortening Zach.

I find Elias unnecessarily fussy. It's ok, shortened to Eli, but then I see Eli as a name in it's own right so I would bypass Elias (and the equally fussy Elijah) and just have Eli as a given name if you'll shorten to it anyway.

If you don't intend to shorten Elias, I would definitely opt for Zachary/Zach.

I can see why you're torn! They're both lovely IMO.

I slightly prefer Zachary I think!

Only downside of Zach I know from the one in my family is that he will be forever clarifying Zach/Zack/Zak/Zac

Zachary

Zachary
Zach for short is nice too

There are far too many E and El names about

As a teacher, everyone knows how to both spell and pronounce Zachary, but Elias usually gets "interesting" mispronunciations/spellings. I would go Zachary personally to save them keeping having to correct people their whole life

Zachary, I do love Elias though but I do think it will get mispronounced

I would prefer the full name, just because Zach is a more common name + I do prefer something that isn’t overused. X

@Eloise1995 , both names are 3 syllables, so it is highly likely they'll be shortened.

Although I’ve only ever met a couple of both, partly based on that I think Zachary is much more likely to be shortened - Zack is one of those friendly nn’s like Jack, Sam, Max etc that people just seem drawn to using. Where as Eli is a distinct name in its own right, so while it’s a possibility for Elias it don’t think it’s automatic.

Personally I prefer Zack/Zachary as I like the friendly sound over the harsher “lie” one in Elias. But if you are bothered about nn’s, I’d stick with Elias (though to me it’s shame no-one in the UK uses the European pronunciation of Elias “Ee-lee -us” as imo it’s much nicer).

Zachary

Elias.

I like both but prefer Zachary. Zach is lovely shortener. However Elias is nice, Eli. My son's girlfriend has a boy called Elijah and I think that's great too, I daresay friends call him 'Eli'. They are all classic, friendly names. However 'Zachary' is my favourite.

Elias