Caylee
Feminine
Caylee belongs to the American practice of building a name from two familiar sounds — Kay and Lee, or Cayla and the -ee ending — and treating the result as one word.
How old is the name Caylee?
Caylee first appears in US birth records in 1980 — 45 years ago. The typical Caylee alive today was born around 2010, making them about 15 years old. About 9,700 people named Caylee are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Caylee most popular?
Caylee peaked in 2009, reaching #264 nationally. Today it ranks #2194, 1,930 places below that high. See the whole 2009 chart.
Where it comes from
Origin, sound and short forms
Our story of Caylee
Our story of Caylee begins with two sounds that were already everywhere. Kay was one of the great middle names of the century and Lee was the other, and a generation of parents who had both in their own families ran them together and gave the result to a daughter. Spelled a dozen ways — Kaylee, Kayleigh, Caylee, Kaylie — it rose through the 1990s and into the 2000s, one of the most successful invented names the American registers have ever carried.
Meaningnot established
Not established
No inherited meaning. It is generally read as a compound of Kay and Lee, or as a respelling of the Irish surname-name Kelly, or as an elaboration of Cayla. None is documented. The name enters American records in the late twentieth century already formed.
Pronouncing Caylee
KAY-lee
Two syllables, stress on the first. Every spelling in the family is said identically.
Nicknames for Caylee
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1980
- Most girls named
- 20091,247 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #264reached in 2009
- Change vs 2024
- −19.2%84 in 2025, from 104
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Caylee in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Kaylee in English — spelling variant
- Kayleigh in English — spelling variant
- Kaylie in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California, Georgia.
Caylees among us
people named Caylee are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 19,134 born in 2025 was named Caylee
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Caylee
- #2194
- Caylee on the 2025 chart
- #234
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Caylee went to 84 girls in 2025, but Kaylee, Kailee and Cailee and the rest below are the same name said out loud. Together the 5 spellings went to 1,431, which makes it the 234th most-given girls’ name of the year — 1,960 places above the chart.
About 1 girl in 1,123 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 19,134 for Caylee itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Bernadine test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Caylee's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Bernadine climbed just as high around 1931, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Bernadine's path sketches the road Caylee is walking now.
Caylee sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Caylee is headed
Caylee is easing off slowly — about 26% fewer babies a year by 2030 if the trend continues.
Medium confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Caylee beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Caylee in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Both halves are familiar names in their own right, so the whole is instantly readable.
- Two clean syllables with no pronunciation risk at all.
- Cay and Lee are both usable short forms.
- It has no inherited meaning to offer.
- The spellings proliferated to an extreme degree, so this one is rarely assumed.
- It is tightly dated to the 1990s and 2000s.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Caylee
Feminine · #2194 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Caylees are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 9,700 people named Caylee are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Caylee?
- Caylee is one of 5 recorded spellings. Kaylee is the more common one — 1,205 births in 2025 against 84 for Caylee.
- How popular is the name Caylee in 2025?
- Caylee ranks #2194 among US girl names in 2025, with 84 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Caylee?
- About 1 in every 19,134 US girls born in 2025 was named Caylee — 84 in all.
- Will my child share the name Caylee with classmates?
- Caylee will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Caylee
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Janna#2194 · Samiya#2194 · Addalyn#2194 · Asia#2194 · Olympia#2194 · Zaila#2194 · Aqsa#2194 · Annaleigh#2194
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Caylee? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Caylee and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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