Paislee
Feminine · “From Paisley”
Behind this spelling stands a real town on the White Cart Water in western Scotland, and behind the town stands the swirling teardrop pattern its mills wove into shawls in the nineteenth century, copied from Kashmiri and Persian designs. Paislee takes that word and rewrites its ending in the -lee style that American parents have used for Bailee, Kaylee and Hadlee. It reads exactly as it sounds, which is not something every respelling can claim.
How old is the name Paislee?
Paislee first appears in US birth records in 1990 — 35 years ago. The typical Paislee is a kid of about 8 — this name's wave is very recent. About 11,000 people named Paislee are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Paislee most popular?
Paislee peaked in 2016, reaching #283 nationally. Today it ranks #666, 383 places below that high. See the whole 2016 chart.
Where it comes from
From Paisley (Scottish place name) to Paislee
The story of Paislee
Paisley began as a place, grew into a Scottish surname carried out to Ulster and North America, and only lately became a first name for girls in the United States. Its worldwide fame came from cloth: the Paisley mills of Renfrewshire mass-produced shawls in the nineteenth century bearing the curved boteh motif of Kashmir and Persia, and the pattern took the town's name permanently. The -lee respelling is a recent American development, part of a broad habit of rebuilding -ley and -ly endings with a double e. Paislee's whole record on the charts belongs to that habit, which is why the children who carry it are still young.
Meaningscholars disagree
From Paisley, a town in Renfrewshire, Scotland
Scholars of Scottish place names divide over the town's own origin. One reading traces it to Latin basilica, 'church', reaching Scots through Middle Irish baslec — the town grew around a medieval abbey. Another looks to a Brittonic word for pasture. The name reached children by way of the place and the surname, not by way of a word for a person.
How the name formed
- PaisleyScottish place name
- Paisleysurname
- Paisleygiven name
- Paislee
Related forms: Paisley · Paizlee
Pronouncing Paislee
PAYZ-lee
Two syllables, stress on the first, with a z sound in the middle. The respelled ending changes nothing about how it is said — it sounds the same as Paisley.
Nicknames for Paislee
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
- 1990
- Most girls named
- 20161,132 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #283reached in 2016
- Change vs 2024
- −8.2%423 in 2025, from 461
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.
Paislee in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Paisley in English — spelling variant
- Paizlee in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, Ohio, Tennessee.
Paislees among us
people named Paislee are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 3,800 born in 2025 was named Paislee
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Paislee
- #666
- Paislee on the 2025 chart
- #538
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Paislee went to 423 girls in 2025, but Paizlee and Payslee are the same name said out loud. Together the 3 spellings went to 467, which makes it the 538th most-given girls’ name of the year — 128 places above the chart.
- Paislee423
- Paizlee28
- Payslee16
About 1 girl in 3,442 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 3,800 for Paislee 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 Sybil test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Paislee's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Sybil climbed just as high around 1919, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Sybil's path sketches the road Paislee is walking now.
Paislee 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 Paislee is headed
Paislee is easing off slowly — about 24% 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.
Paislee beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Paislee in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Sound-transparent: almost anyone who sees it says it right on the first try, which is not true of every modern respelling.
- The -lee ending is already familiar to American ears through Bailee, Kaylee and Hadlee, so the shape needs no explaining.
- Anchored in something real and traceable — a Scottish town, an abbey, and the woven pattern that still carries the name worldwide.
- Rare enough that a child is unlikely to share it with a classmate, while the underlying sound is widely recognized.
- This is the less common of the two spellings, so expect a lifetime of gentle corrections to Paisley — on registers, coffee cups and forms. Spelling it aloud becomes a habit early.
- Respelled -lee endings are strongly tied to a recent stretch of American naming, and the chart shows it stepping back from its high point. The name will read as belonging to a particular era.
- The paisley pattern is a well-known fabric print, so some people will hear the cloth before they hear the name. That association is decorative rather than unkind, and it fades quickly with a person attached to it.
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What they receive
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Paislee
Feminine · #666 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Paislees are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 11,000 people named Paislee are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Paislee?
- Paislee is the most-used spelling in US records — 423 of the 467 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Paizlee and Payslee.
- How popular is the name Paislee in 2025?
- Paislee ranks #666 among US girl names in 2025, with 423 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Paislee?
- About 1 in every 3,800 US girls born in 2025 was named Paislee — 423 in all.
- Will my child share the name Paislee with classmates?
- Paislee will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Paislee
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Oakleigh#666 · Jolene#666 · Marisol#666 · Jessica#665 · Isabela#664 · Yaretzi#670 · Legacy#662 · Birdie#670
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Paislee? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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