Declining since 2002, #10,917 for girls today.
Popularity of Kaeleigh since 1985
Babies named Kaeleigh per year in U.S. Social Security records. Raw births topped out in 2008, but relative to how few babies were recorded back then, Kaeleigh's real moment was 2002.
Data table (by decade)
| Decade | Girls |
|---|---|
| 1980s | 79 |
| 1990s | 361 |
| 2000s | 582 |
| 2010s | 342 |
| 2020s | 62 |
Meaning & origin
Kaeleigh entered the U.S. baby name charts in 1985, a period when creative respellings of established names became increasingly common. The name saw its strongest period of use in the early 2000s, reaching its peak rank in 2002. Since then, its use has steadily declined each year through 2025, a trajectory that mirrors many names from the same era that rose quickly and then faded. With a current frequency of about 1 in every 200,908 births, Kaeleigh remains a rare but recognizable choice, reflecting a broader trend of distinctive spelling variations that emerged in the late 20th century.
Kaeleigh is a modern phonetic respelling of the name Kaylee, which gained popularity in the late 20th century. Kaylee itself may derive from the Irish surname Caollaidhe, anglicized as Keely, meaning 'slender'. Alternatively, it could be a combination of the name Kay (often a diminutive of Katherine) and the common suffix -lee from words like 'lea' (meadow). The spelling Kaeleigh follows a trend of using 'ae' to create a distinctive variation, particularly in the United States in the 1980s and 1990s.
Nicknames & variants
Nicknames: Kae, Leigh, Lee
Sibling names for Kaeleigh
Names that share Kaeleigh's style, for a brother or sister.
