Ailie
A feminine diminutive of Alice (of Old German origin, meaning "noble and kind").
Name Census estimates that about 239 living Americans carry the first name Ailie. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Ailie today is around 18 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Ailie births was 2012 (19 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Ailie. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Ailie with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
239
~ 1 in 1,434,119 Americans
Peak year
2012
19 babies that year
Average age
18
years old
2024 SSA rank
#15,311
Tracked since 1906
Census
Ailie in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 291 people with the first name Ailie, which placed it at #30,113 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#30,113
National first-name rank
People counted
291
291 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
74.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Ailie
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ailie is White at 74.9%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (9.6%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (7.2%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Ailie described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Ailie at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White74.9% · 218
- Two or more races9.6% · 28
- Asian and Pacific Islander7.2% · 21
- Hispanic or Latino6.5% · 19
- Black or African American1.7% · 5
Popularity
Ailie: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Ailie from the 1900s through to the 2020s, spanning 9 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 116 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 2000s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Ailie by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Ailie during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Ailies live
Origin
Meaning and history of Ailie
The name Ailie is a Scottish diminutive form of the feminine name Alice, which has its roots in the Old French name Alis, derived from the Germanic name Adalhaidis. Adalhaidis is composed of the Germanic elements "adal" meaning "noble" and "haid" meaning "kind, sort, type." The name Alice was introduced to Britain after the Norman Conquest of 1066.
In medieval times, Ailie was a popular pet form of Alice used in Scotland. It first appeared in written records in the late 15th century, with one of the earliest known bearers being Ailie Munro, who lived in the Scottish Highlands in the 1480s.
The name Ailie gained further recognition in the 16th century with the birth of Ailie Douglas (c. 1525-1588), a Scottish noblewoman and courtier who served as a lady-in-waiting to Mary, Queen of Scots. Her life and relationship with the Queen are documented in various historical accounts of the time.
Another notable Ailie from history was Ailie Rennie (1778-1863), a Scottish folk singer and balladeer from Perthshire. She was renowned for her vast repertoire of traditional Scottish songs and ballads, which she helped preserve and pass down to future generations.
In the literary world, Ailie was the name of a character in the 19th-century Scottish novel "The Provost" by John Galt. The novel, published in 1822, depicted the life and times of a Scottish town during the Napoleonic Wars.
A more recent figure named Ailie was Ailie Donald (1915-1998), a Scottish artist and sculptor who gained recognition for her public artworks and sculptures in various cities across Scotland, including Glasgow and Edinburgh.
While the name Ailie has remained primarily used in Scotland, it has also been adopted in other parts of the English-speaking world, though to a lesser extent. Its enduring popularity in Scotland can be attributed to its rich cultural heritage and association with notable figures throughout Scottish history.
People
Ailie + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Ailie as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with A
Other first names starting with A with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Ailie: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Ailie?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 239 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Ailie going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 1,434,119 US residents.
Is Ailie a common name?
We classify Ailie as "Very Rare". It ranks above 76.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 376 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Ailie most popular?
The single biggest year for Ailie was 2012, when 19 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Ailie is about 18 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Ailie in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 291 people with the name Ailie, or 0.10 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #30,113 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Ailie in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Ailie?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ailie appears almost entirely female. Of the 286 people counted with this name, 99.7% were female and only a very small share were male. The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Ailie?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ailie is White at 74.9%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (9.6%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (7.2%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Ailie most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Ailie in the 2020 Census, accounting for 74.9% (218 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Ailie in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Ailie a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Ailie in the SSA data are female. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Ailie still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Ailie in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Ailie can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How many people have the name Ailie?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.