Leslie
A unisex name of Celtic origin meaning "garden of hollies" or "gray fort".
Name Census estimates that about 283,420 living Americans carry the first name Leslie. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 70.5% of registrations being female. The average person named Leslie today is around 51 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Leslie births was 1957 (8,199 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Leslie. 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 Leslie with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Leslie started out as a boys' name but over the decades crossed over and is now given to girls far more often.
- • Compared to the 1960s, recent registration numbers for Leslie have dropped to less than 5% of what they once were.
People living today
283K
~ 1 in 1,209 Americans
Peak year
1957
8,199 babies that year
Average age
51
years old
2024 SSA rank
#605
Tracked since 1880
Census
Leslie in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 290,496 people with the first name Leslie, which placed it at #179 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
#179
National first-name rank
People counted
290K
290,496 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
96.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
65.6% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Leslie
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Leslie is White at 65.6%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (21.3%) and Black (8.2%). 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 Leslie 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 Leslie at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White65.6% · 190,537
- Hispanic or Latino21.3% · 61,845
- Black or African American8.2% · 23,789
- Two or more races2.3% · 6,780
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.9% · 5,545
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.7% · 2,000
Gender
Gender distribution for Leslie
Leslie is one of the more evenly split names in the SSA data. Of the 382,987 total registrations, 112,958 (29.5%) were male and 270,029 (70.5%) were female.
Leslie as a male name
- Ranked #3,016 in 2024
- 41 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1952 (2,359 births)
Leslie as a female name
- Ranked #605 in 2024
- 495 female births in 2024
- Peak: 1957 (6,103 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Leslie leans strongly female. 237,654 people counted with this name were female (81.8%), compared with 52,838 male bearers (18.2%).
Popularity
Leslie: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Leslie from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1960s, with 68,174 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1960s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Leslie 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 Leslie during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
| Decade | Male | Female | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1880s | 1,292 | 126 | 1,418 |
| 1890s | 2,063 | 257 | 2,320 |
| 1900s | 2,531 | 324 | 2,855 |
| 1910s | 10,630 | 785 | 11,415 |
| 1920s | 15,065 | 1,241 | 16,306 |
| 1930s | 12,242 | 1,447 | 13,689 |
| 1940s | 19,389 | 14,856 | 34,245 |
| 1950s | 21,382 | 43,048 | 64,430 |
| 1960s | 13,723 | 54,451 | 68,174 |
| 1970s | 7,195 | 44,840 | 52,035 |
| 1980s | 3,864 | 38,729 | 42,593 |
| 1990s | 1,960 | 26,771 | 28,731 |
| 2000s | 967 | 31,052 | 32,019 |
| 2010s | 482 | 9,749 | 10,231 |
| 2020s | 173 | 2,353 | 2,526 |
Geography
Where Leslies live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Leslie, while Alaska, Vermont, Delaware recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 7,266 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Leslie
The name Leslie has its origins in the ancient Germanic language, derived from the combination of the elements "lesc," meaning "meadow," and "rid," meaning "rider." It first emerged in Scotland during the 12th century as a Scottish surname, likely referring to a person who lived near or tended to a meadow.
In its earliest recorded use as a given name, Leslie was predominantly a masculine name. One of the earliest known bearers was Leslie of Balquhain, a Scottish nobleman who lived in the 13th century and served as a knight under King Alexander III of Scotland.
As time passed, the name Leslie gained popularity among the Scottish aristocracy and gentry. Notable historical figures with this name include Sir Andrew Leslie (1580-1644), a Scottish military commander who played a significant role in the Thirty Years' War, and Alexander Leslie (1580-1661), a Scottish soldier and military commander who fought for the Covenanters during the Wars of the Three Kingdoms.
While Leslie remained primarily a Scottish name for several centuries, it eventually spread to other parts of the British Isles and beyond. One of the earliest recorded examples of Leslie as a feminine name is Lady Leslie Rayner (1854-1935), an English author and philanthropist.
Other notable individuals named Leslie throughout history include Leslie Howard (1893-1943), an English actor and director best known for his role in the film "Gone with the Wind," and Leslie Charteris (1907-1993), an American author and creator of the famous character "The Saint."
As the name gained popularity in the 20th century, it continued to be used for both males and females, though it became more commonly associated with women. Leslie Nielsen (1926-2010), a Canadian actor and comedian known for his roles in comedy films like "Airplane!" and "The Naked Gun" series, is one of the more prominent male bearers of the name in recent history.
Throughout its long history, the name Leslie has maintained a strong connection to its Scottish roots, while also transcending cultural boundaries and becoming a widely recognized and beloved name across various regions and ethnicities.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Leslie
People
Leslie + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Leslie as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with L
Other first names starting with L with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Leslie: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Leslie?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 283,420 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Leslie 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 1,209 US residents.
Is Leslie a common name?
We classify Leslie as "Common". It ranks above 99.8% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 382,987 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Leslie most popular?
The single biggest year for Leslie was 1957, when 8,199 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Leslie is about 51 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Leslie in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 290,496 people with the name Leslie, or 96.18 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #179 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 Leslie 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 Leslie?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Leslie leans strongly female. 237,654 people counted with this name were female (81.8%), compared with 52,838 male bearers (18.2%). 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 Leslie?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Leslie is White at 65.6%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (21.3%) and Black (8.2%). 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 Leslie most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Leslie in the 2020 Census, accounting for 65.6% (190,537 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 Leslie in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Leslie a female name?
Yes, 70.5% of people registered as Leslie 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 Leslie still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Leslie 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 Leslie 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 Leslie?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.