Macleay
surname · Latin script
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Macleay is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United Kingdom than in any other country. Recorded meaning: see McClay.
- USUnited States1 in 1.9M(measured from records)
- LBLebanon≈1 in 253K
- GBUnited Kingdom≈1 in 336K
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- United Kingdom (inferred from the name graph)
- Sources
- 132 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 253K (inferred from the name graph)
≈200 people, est.
Highest-authority source
Lebanon, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
see McClay.
Sources 1
- Dictionary of American Family Names
Where in the world(measured from records)
Macleay 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GB United Kingdom | ≈200 est. | ≈1 in 336K | — | Macleay | 77 |
| US United States | 173 | 1 in 1.9M | 215 | Macleay | 132 |
| AU Australia | ≈70 est. | ≈1 in 364K | 1 | Macleay | 47 |
| CA Canada | ≈48 est. | ≈1 in 789K | — | Macleay | 29 |
| PH Philippines | ≈24 est. | ≈1 in 4.6M | — | Macleay | 1 |
| LB Lebanon | ≈22 est. | ≈1 in 253K | — | Macleay | 1 |
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 — Surname Frequency 2010; Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020; SA BDM — Popular baby names South Australia (1944–present). 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).
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- Alexander Macleayb. 1767GBBritish entomologist and public servant in the colony of New South Wales (1767–1848)
- William Sharp Macleayb. 1792GBBritish civil servant and entomologist, active in Cuba and New South Wales, Australia (1792–1865)
- Kenneth MacLeayb. 1802Scottish painter (1802-1878)
- George Macleayb. 1809GBpastoralist, explorer and politician in New South Wales, Australia (1809–1891)
- William John Macleayb. 1820GBpolitician and naturalist in New South Wales, Australia (1820-1891)
- Kenneth Noel Grant Macleayb. 1903GBBritish botanist in Africa, fern specialist (1903-1989)
- Scott MacLeayb. 1950CACanadian photographer, composer and new media artist
- Ken MacLeayb. 1959AUcricketer
- D.J. MacLeayb. 1994USAmerican basketball player and coach (born 1994)
- Kenneth MacLeayScottish self-styled surgeon and antiquarian
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).
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 7 sources across 2 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AU Australia | SA BDM — Popular baby names South Australia (1944–present) | 2007 | 1 | — |
Reference works 2
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- 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
- What does the name Macleay mean?
- Recorded meaning: see McClay.
- In which country does Macleay have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 196 people named Macleay in the United Kingdom, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled macleay.
- How common is the name Macleay?
- In the United States, the national register counted 173 people named Macleay in 2010, about 1 in 1.9 million residents.
What do you want to know about Macleay?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/macleayThe same payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. Rate-limited for casual use; a free API key gives 1,000 requests a day, and bulk access is licensed separately.
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, “Macleay”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.