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The LotR wiki lists people who have been deemed as Elf-friends by the Elves.

Different people have been named as Elf-friends for different reasons. Do all the Elf's have the power/authority to declare somebody as a Elf friend or it is restricted to few?

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It seems that any elf could bestow this title.

Frodo is named as an Elf-friend by Gildor Inglorion, when he encounters a group of elves on the borders of the Shire on his way to Bree. Gildor does not appear to have any special status among the elves.

In any case, the title seems to be largely honourary (as James Khoury says in comments). At best, other elves who heard that a certain mortal was an elf-friend might be somewhat more welcoming towards that mortal. At worst, it wouldn't make much difference at all. When the Elves of Lothlórien meet the Fellowship they are distinctly suspicious, even though it contains an actual elf and at least two Elf-friends, specifically Frodo and Aragorn.

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  • I agree with you, Haldir recognizes Legolas as one of his kindred from the north and recognized Aragorn as a friend to Galadriel. He had problem with Gimli's presence. But just as an after thought if all the Elf's could name somebody as Elf friend, Shouldn't the number of people named as Elf friend be larger than 8?
    – Vishvesh
    Commented Mar 20, 2015 at 14:12
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    @Vishvesh: Gimli was the main problem, but they weren't very welcoming to the other non-elves in the Fellowship either. And there are only 8 named elf-friends in Tolkien's works, there could have been more. Conversely, contact between elves and mortals in the Third Age was pretty limited, so it might have been rare for anyone to be named elf-friend.
    – Royal Canadian Bandit
    Commented Mar 20, 2015 at 14:22

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