Hailey
Feminine · Old English roots · “hay clearing”
Hailey is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 181,434 girls against 276 boys since 1880.
Hailey began as a patch of English ground — a hay meadow, fenced and cut, that gave its name to villages and then to the families who came from them. It traveled the usual English route from place to surname to first name, and in the United States it became the spelling that outgrew all its rivals. Two syllables, both open, ending in the same bright -lee that so much of the modern nursery shares.
How old is the name Hailey?
Hailey first appears in US birth records in 1963 — 62 years ago. The typical Hailey alive today was born around 2006, making them about 19 years old. About 180,000 people named Hailey are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Hailey most popular?
Hailey peaked in 2010, reaching #19 nationally. Today it ranks #104, 85 places below that high. See the whole 2010 chart.
Where it comes from
From hēg-lēah (Old English) to Hailey
The story of Hailey
The oldest layer is a landscape word: lēah, an Old English term for a clearing in woodland, joined to hēg, hay — ground cleared and kept for mowing. Settlements with that description were called Hailey, and families who left them carried the place with them as a surname. English surnames drifted into first-name use through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and Hailey followed that path, arriving on American birth records well after Haley and Hayley were already circulating. Of the several spellings that rose together, this one pulled clearly ahead in the United States and became the standard form there.
Meaning
hay clearing, hay meadow
From Old English hēg (hay) and lēah (woodland clearing or meadow) — the source of the Oxfordshire and Hertfordshire villages called Hailey, and of the surnames Hailey and Haley taken from them.
Cultural footprint
Hailey Bieber (b. 1996) — Model and Rhode beauty founder, married to Justin Bieber
Source: Wikidata — the one source on this page that is not an official agency.
How the name formed
- hēg-lēahOld English
- HaileyEnglish place name
- Haley / Haileysurname
- Haileygiven name
Related forms: Hayley · Haley · Hailee · Haleigh · Hayleigh
Pronouncing Hailey
HAY-lee
Stress on the first syllable. All the common spellings — Hailey, Hayley, Haley, Hailee — are said exactly the same way, which is why they are so easily confused in writing.
Nicknames for Hailey
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
- 1963
- Most girls named
- 20038,798 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #19reached in 2010
- Change vs 2024
- −2.7%2,556 in 2025, from 2,627
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.
Hailey in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Hayley in English (British usage) — spelling variant
- Haley in English — spelling variant
- Hailee in English — spelling variant
- Haleigh in English — spelling variant
- Hayleigh in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York. International figures from Statistics Canada. Sources
Haileys among us
people named Hailey are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 629 born in 2025 was named Hailey
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Cindy test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Hailey's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Cindy climbed just as high around 1957, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Cindy's path sketches the road Hailey is walking now.
Hailey is coming down from a big peak (#19 in 2010). This is the stretch of the cycle where a name starts to sound like the decade it ruled.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Hailey is headed
Hailey should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
High 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.
Hailey beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Hailey in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Pronunciation is immediate: almost no English speaker hesitates over it, in any of its spellings.
- Hailey is the spelling that became standard in American records, so it is the one clerks and teachers are most likely to guess first.
- The surname and place name behind it are documented in England for centuries, giving the name a long paper trail.
- It charts in Canada as well as the United States, so it travels without translation across English-speaking countries.
- Hayley, Haley, Hailee and Haleigh all remain in use, so this name will be spelled back at you wrongly now and then for life. Saying the letters becomes routine rather than remarkable.
- It rose sharply and has been easing back, which means it reads as a name of the millennial-and-after generations rather than a neutral classic — most people named Hailey today are young adults.
- The -lee ending is shared with a whole cluster of popular names, so it may blend acoustically with classmates called Riley, Bailey or Kaylee even when no other Hailey is present.
- One well-known bearer is a model and beauty-brand founder, which is currently the first association for many people. Associations like that shift with the decade.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Hailey
Feminine · Old English roots · #104 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Haileys are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 180,000 people named Hailey are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Hailey in 2025?
- Hailey ranks #104 among US girl names in 2025, with 2,556 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Hailey?
- About 1 in every 629 US girls born in 2025 was named Hailey — 2,556 in all.
- Will my child share the name Hailey with classmates?
- Hailey will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Hailey
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Gabriella#105 · Allison#103 · Margot#102 · Parker#106 · Anna#107 · Aaliyah#101 · Juniper#100 · Cecilia#108
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Hailey? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Hailey and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration; international figures from national statistics agencies. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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