Karleigh
Feminine · “free man”
Karleigh is a respelling of Carly, the feminine of Carl — and Carl is a Germanic word that named the free man of the ordinary rank, neither noble nor bound.
How old is the name Karleigh?
Karleigh first appears in US birth records in 1983 — 42 years ago. The typical Karleigh alive today was born around 2010, making them about 15 years old. About 5,000 people named Karleigh are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Karleigh most popular?
Karleigh peaked in 2013, reaching #1046 nationally. Today it ranks #3389, 2,343 places below that high. See the whole 2013 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From karl to Karleigh
The story of Karleigh
Karl was an ordinary word before it was a name, and one Frankish emperor made it one of the great names of Europe. Its English feminines are much more recent: Charlotte came from France, Carla from Italy and Germany, and Carly was made in twentieth-century America. Karleigh belongs to a later layer still, adding the -eigh ending that Ashleigh and Kayleigh had made familiar by the 1990s.
Meaning
free man
From Germanic karl, a free man; Charlemagne's name made it royal across Europe, and the Slavic word for a king descends from his. Carly is the twentieth-century English feminine formed from Carl.
How the name formed
- karl
- Carl
- Carly
- Karleigh
Related forms: Carly · Karla · Charlotte
Pronouncing Karleigh
KAR-lee
Two syllables, first stressed. Every spelling of the name sounds the same.
Nicknames for Karleigh
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
- 1983
- Most girls named
- 2016237 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1046reached in 2013
- Change vs 2024
- −13.5%45 in 2025, from 52
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.
Karleigh in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Carly in English — spelling variant
- Karla in German — related form
- Charlotte in French — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, Mississippi, Alabama.
Karleighs among us
people named Karleigh are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 35,717 born in 2025 was named Karleigh
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Karleigh
- #3389
- Karleigh on the 2025 chart
- #848
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Karleigh went to 45 girls in 2025, but Carleigh is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 112, which makes it the 848th most-given girls’ name of the year — 2,541 places above the chart.
- Carleigh67
- Karleigh45
About 1 girl in 14,351 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 35,717 for Karleigh 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 Merissa test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Karleigh's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Merissa climbed just as high around 1995, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Merissa's path sketches the road Karleigh is walking now.
Karleigh 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 Karleigh is headed
Karleigh is easing off slowly — about 38% 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.
Karleigh beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Karleigh in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A settled meaning inherited from one of the longest-running names in Europe.
- Leigh is a complete short form in its own right.
- Read correctly on sight by every English speaker.
- The -eigh ending is five letters doing the work of two, and she will spell it aloud for life.
- Carly, Karly, Karlee and Karleigh are four live spellings of one name.
- It is strongly associated with a particular decade of American naming.
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What they receive
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Karleigh
Feminine · #3389 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Karleighs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 5,000 people named Karleigh are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Karleigh?
- Karleigh is one of 2 recorded spellings. Carleigh is the more common one — 67 births in 2025 against 45 for Karleigh.
- How popular is the name Karleigh in 2025?
- Karleigh ranks #3389 among US girl names in 2025, with 45 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Karleigh?
- About 1 in every 35,717 US girls born in 2025 was named Karleigh — 45 in all.
- Will my child share the name Karleigh with classmates?
- Karleigh will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Karleigh
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Katheryn#3389 · Posey#3389 · Ronni#3389 · Gittel#3389 · Betsabe#3389 · Germany#3389 · Jaslene#3389 · Lovina#3389
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Karleigh? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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