Lee
Masculine · Old English roots · “Clearing”
Lee is given to both — 233,627 boys and 62,299 girls since 1880. See Lee as a girl nameSee other names given to both
Lee began as a description of a place — a clearing in the woods, a patch of open ground — and became first a surname, then a first name given to hundreds of thousands of American children. It is one syllable, spelled the way it sounds, and it has never dropped off the record since American names were first counted. Among the generations now in their seventies and eighties it is still strongly represented; among newborns it is quiet but never absent.
How old is the name Lee?
Lee was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Lee alive today was born around 1951, making them about 74 years old. About 128,000 people named Lee are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Lee most popular?
Lee peaked in 1900, reaching #39 nationally. Today it ranks #725, 686 places below that high. See the whole 1900 chart.
Where it comes from
From lēah (Old English, 'clearing') to Lee
The story of Lee
Lēah, the Old English word for a clearing, scattered itself across the English landscape and stuck to the families who lived there, giving Lee, Leigh, Legh and Lea as surnames. In the United States it made the ordinary nineteenth-century jump from surname to first name, and did so on a very large scale in the South, where boys were widely named after the Confederate general Robert E. Lee — a piece of history worth knowing about a name that otherwise means only a field. It traveled separately as a romanization: Chinese and Korean families named 李 have written it Lee in English for well over a century. The name also became one of the most-used middle names in American English, which is why it feels familiar even to people who have never met a Lee.
Meaning
Clearing, meadow, open ground in woodland
The English name comes from Old English lēah, a woodland clearing — the same word behind hundreds of English place names ending in -ley and -leigh. Written the same way, Lee is also the standard romanization of the Chinese surname 李 (Lǐ, 'plum tree') and a common romanization of the Korean surname 이 / 李. Those are separate names that arrived at the same four letters, not one name with two meanings.
How the name formed
- lēahOld English, 'clearing'
- Lee / LeighEnglish place names
- LeeEnglish surname
- Leegiven name
Related forms: Leigh · Li / Lǐ (李) · Yi / Rhee (이, 李) · Lea
Pronouncing Lee
LEE
One syllable, rhyming with 'sea'. It sounds identical to Leigh, Lea and the Chinese surname Li, so people who hear it will often ask which spelling you mean.
Nicknames for Lee
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
- 1880
- Most boys named
- 19513,682 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #39reached in 1900
- Change vs 2022
- −3.4%366 in 2025, from 379
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.
Lee in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Leigh in English — spelling variant
- Li / Lǐ (李) in Chinese — transliteration
- Yi / Rhee (이, 李) in Korean — transliteration
- Lea in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California, Pennsylvania.
Lees among us
people named Lee are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 4,667 born in 2025 was named Lee
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
Fashion outlook
Lee has held the top-100 across 8 different decades — it has never depended on fashion, and names like that read the same at any age.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Lee is headed
Lee should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
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.
Lee beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Lee in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- One syllable, four letters, and spelled exactly as it sounds — almost never mispronounced by an English speaker on first sight.
- Unbroken presence in American records since counting began, so it reads as familiar rather than invented at any age.
- Works across languages: the same four letters are the everyday English form of Chinese 李 and Korean 이.
- Long established as both a first and a middle name, and given to boys and girls alike, which makes it flexible in a family naming pattern.
- Needs no nickname — it is already the short form of several longer names.
- In the American South especially, Lee was given to generations of boys in honor of the Confederate general Robert E. Lee. That association has faded a great deal, but it has not vanished, and some people will still hear it.
- Lee, Leigh and Lea sound the same. Expect a lifetime of spelling it out over the phone, even though the name itself is simple.
- It is one of the most-used middle names in American English, so in first position it can briefly read as a middle name to people scanning a list.
- With a short surname, Lee can land very clipped — worth saying the full name aloud a few times before deciding.
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What they receive
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Lee
Masculine · Old English roots · #725 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Lees are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 128,000 people named Lee are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Lee in 2025?
- Lee ranks #725 among US boy names in 2025, with 366 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Lee?
- About 1 in every 4,667 US boys born in 2025 was named Lee — 366 in all.
- Will my child share the name Lee with classmates?
- Lee will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Lee
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Jahmir#725 · Braylen#725 · Neithan#723 · Westyn#723 · Dustin#728 · Ander#728 · Cannon#721 · Bellamy#721
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Lee? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Lee and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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