Elly Akira is a Japanese AV actress and adult model. She was formerly known as Yuka Osawa and Hitomi Nishikawa. A highly prolific performer, she had appeared in more than 900 adult videos, with 800 currently listed on the site of the major Japanese video retailer DMM.

Akira was born in Saudi Arabia to a Japanese mother and Syrian father and is the second of three daughters. She has stated that although she was born in Saudi Arabia, she grew up in Tokyo, Japan and was not raised with the Islamic sense of morality that might consider women showing skin haram.

She started her AV career in July 2005 under the name of Yuka Osawa with the video First Flower - Yuka Osawa for the KUKI production studios and around 2006 she transferred to the highly esteemed AV studio S1 No. 1 Style. However, after a few films, she became a freelance actress working with many studios. She earned the title Queen Shiofuki after a string of movies from 2007 with names like Tokyo Slimy Night, Splash Girl and Non Stop Orgasm.

Akira made her debut in the softcore genre of pink film in 2007, appearing in three titles directed by Yutaka Ikejima including Fascinating Woman: The Temptation of Creampie, which was named as Best Film 8th Place at the 20th Pink Grand Prix, a Japanese annual film awards event. For her work in these films, Akira was given one of the Best New Actress awards.

Akira quickly became known for prolific output and willingness to appear in extreme or highly fetishist roles. She became a regular go-to-actress for studios like Dogma or Natural High and even performed the most demanding type of roles that included anal sex, S&M, enemas, and urolagnia.

In May 2008, she starred in Naked Continent 4, the best-selling fourth entry in Soft On Demand's controversial AV series Naked Continent. At the 2009 AV Grand Prix Awards, Akira took two top prizes, the Digital Sales Award for her video Vomit Enema Ecstasy X co-starring Mayura Hoshitsuki for the Dogma studio, and a second award, the Best Lovely / Moe Video for her solo work Tera-Dick.

In 2009, she changed her name to Elly Akira and had roles in mainstream films such as the drama Yoko Namino: On Special Assignment directed by Yūji Tajiri and released in Japan on 18 September 2009 and When You Love and When You Are Loved from the Love&Eros CINEMA COLLECTION which was released in October 2010. In March 2010, she was one of five actresses nominated as Best Actress at the Adult Broadcasting Awards ceremony.

Akira was on hand in January 2011 to help launch a new label ＡＴＯＭ for one of Japan's largest AV producers, Soft On Demand. On 19 November 2011, she starred in W Monster - Golden Showers Anal And Creampies alongside with fellow AV actress Marica Hase.

In 2012, video retailer DMM held a vote for the 30th anniversary of the debut of adult videos in Japan to determine the best actresses. Akira was selected as one of the top 100 AV actresses of all time, coming in at number 55. Also in 2012, she starred as a female ninja (kunoichi) in the action period movie Kunoichi shokei jin gōmon jigoku tabi which reached theaters in June 2012.