It was discovered by Austrian astronomer Johann Palisa at the Vienna Observatory on 14 September 1923, and later named after the Swedish town of Gällivare.

[2] Gellivara is an assumed carbonaceous C-type asteroid,[3] which agrees with the overall spectral type of the Themis family.

Lightcurve analysis gave a rotation period of 11.32 hours with a brightness amplitude of 0.35 magnitude (U=2).

[11] According to the surveys carried out by the Infrared Astronomical Satellite IRAS, the Japanese Akari satellite and the NEOWISE mission of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, Gellivara measures between 22.10 and 35.73 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo between 0.0241 and 0.07.

[5][6][7][8][9][10] The Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link agrees with IRAS and derives an albedo of 0.0289 with a diameter of 35.76 kilometers based on an absolute magnitude of 11.7.