Leigh
given name · Latin script
Meaning: habitational name from any of the numerous places (in at least sixteen counties, but especially Leigh in Lancashire) named either with the nominative case of Old English leak ‘woodland clearing’ (see
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/ʎiː/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Leigh is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country.
- AUAustralia≈1 in 1.7K(inferred from the name graph)
- NZNew Zealand≈1 in 2.8K
- GBUnited Kingdom≈1 in 2.8K
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). Where a country counts another spelling of the name rather than Leigh itself, the figure is that spelling’s, and it is named. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- United States (measured from records)
- 2 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 548 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 1.7K (inferred from the name graph)
38,258 people, 2020
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
Australia, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
One other spelling is counted as the same name:
Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records, and ○ marks a model's transliteration; click a spelling to open its page.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
habitational name from any of the numerous places (in at least sixteen counties, but especially Leigh in Lancashire) named either with the nominative case of Old English leak ‘woodland clearing’ (see Lee) or with leage, a late dative form of this word (see Lye).
Sources 1
- Dictionary of American Family Names
Attested across 14 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Leigh counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.
Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | #436 | 38,258 | 1 in 8.7K | 35K | Leigh | 548 |
| GB United Kingdom | #333 | ≈23,000 est. | ≈1 in 2.8K | 88 | Leigh | 315 |
| AU Australia | #240 | ≈15,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.7K | 79 | Leigh | 261 |
| ZA South Africa | #676 | ≈8,100 est. | ≈1 in 7K | — | Leigh | 118 |
| EG Egypt | — | ≈7,500 est. | ≈1 in 14K | — | Leigh | 13 |
| NZ New Zealand | #231 | ≈1,800 est. | ≈1 in 2.8K | 13 | Leigh | 148 |
| AL Albania | — | 1,760as Rei | 1 in 1.7K | 1.7K | Leigh | 11 |
| IE Ireland | #267 | ≈1,200 est. | ≈1 in 4.4K | — | Leigh | 89 |
38,258 people counted by Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex, 2020. Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.
Registers cited: Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; Surnames of England and Wales (taliesin-arlein.net, Sept 2002 electoral register); NSW BDM — Popular baby names (1952–present); DIA — Baby name popularity (1900–present); INSTAT Albania — Search the name (given-name counts). Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).
Other recorded senses(measured from records)
Leigh is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In English, places (in at least sixteen counties)—but especially Leigh in Lancs.—so called from the nom. case of OE leah wood, clearing (see Lee i) or from leage, a form of the dat. case of this word. Vars.: Legh, Legg. The surname Leigh is most common in Ches. and S Lancs. A Ches. family spelling the name Legh claim descent from Edward de Lega, who received large grants of land in the county in the nth cent.
as a nameA dictionary of surnames
,2 Variant of Lee, from an alternative spelling of the surname. Use as a girl’s name may have been influenced by the British actress Vivien Leigh (1913-67), born Vivien Hartly.
as a nameA concise dictionary of first names
In English, A meadow.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Prado
as a name25,000 nombres de bebé. La mejor guía para escoger el nombre adecuado
In Irish, An English name occasionally used as a synonym of Lee
as a nameThe Surnames of Ireland
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- Dorothy L. Sayersb. 1893GBnot in their usual nameEnglish crime writer, playwright, essayist and Christian writer (1893-1957)
- Leigh Harlineb. 1907USAmerican film composer and songwriter (1907-1969)
- Geraldine Chaplinb. 1944USnot in their usual nameBritish-American actress
- Tanya Robertsb. 1949USnot in their usual nameAmerican actress (1949–2021)
- Gillian Andersonb. 1968USnot in their usual nameAmerican actress (born 1968)
- Carmen Electrab. 1972USnot in their usual nameAmerican actress, model, and singer
- Leigh Whannellb. 1977AUAustralian filmmaker and actor
- Rachael Leigh Cookb. 1979USAmerican actress and model
- Kirsty Coventryb. 1983ZWnot in their usual nameZimbabwean swimmer, politician, and sports administrator
- Mandy Mooreb. 1984USnot in their usual nameAmerican actress and singer (born 1984)
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
How to address them(machine-generated)
A formal English salutation is built on the surname, so it needs a full name — on its own, a first name only supports the informal form.
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 64 sources across 32 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 35K | #1,080 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 3.5K | #1,080 |
| AU Australia | NSW BDM — Popular baby names (1952–present) | 1983 | 79 | #92 |
| AU Australia | AU state BDM — consolidated top baby names (NSW + SA + QLD) | 1962 | 43 | — |
| AU Australia | QLD BDM — Top 100 Baby Names Queensland (1960–present) | 1962 | 43 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 31 | — |
| NZ New Zealand | DIA — Baby name popularity (1900–present) | 1995 | 13 | — |
| NZ New Zealand | DIA — Baby name popularity (1900–present) | 1992 | 10 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2023 | 5 | — |
| AU Australia | Australian national given names (aggregated state BDM) | 2012 | 5 | — |
| GB United Kingdom | NISRA — Baby names Northern Ireland full list (1997–present) | 2000 | 4 | #244 |
| GB United Kingdom | NRS — Baby names Scotland full list (1974–present) | 2023 | 3 | #749 |
Reference works 6
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia given-name tokens
- Wikipedia surname tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- Is Leigh a male or female name?
- Leigh is recorded for both men and women. We don't publish a percentage split: a record's gender belongs to the person and is attached to every given name on that record, so names in cultures where a name string also carries a parent's or spouse's given name pick up large cross-gender counts.
- How do you pronounce Leigh?
- A machine transcription gives /ʎiː/ (IPA) for English.
- What does the name Leigh mean, and where does it come from?
- habitational name from any of the numerous places (in at least sixteen counties, but especially Leigh in Lancashire) named either with the nominative case of Old English leak ‘woodland clearing’ (see… Recorded by Dictionary of American Family Names.
- In which country does Leigh have the most bearers?
- In the United States, the national register counted about 38 thousand people named Leigh, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled leigh.
- How common is the name Leigh?
- In the United States, the national register counted 38,258 people named Leigh in 2020, about 1 in 8.7 thousand residents.
- How common is Leigh compared with other names?
- In the United States, Leigh is the 436th most common given name of 2,815,431 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Leigh?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/leighThe payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), which returns what this page shows everyone; the full country table, every register citation and the year-by-year series come with a licensed key, as does bulk access.
About this data
measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated
These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “Leigh” — the 436th most common given name in United States. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.