Leela vs Leesha

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Leela Leesha

Each line is every baby given the name that year, girls and boys added together — the only count that means the same thing for both names. A line breaks where the name fell below five babies in a year — the point at which the SSA stops publishing it — rather than being drawn through a figure nobody published. A single published year in a gap shows as a dot.

Who was ahead

Of the 74 years in which either name was published, Leela for 61 years and Leesha for 13 years. The lead changed hands 16 times.

• 1898–1954 Leela ahead
• 1960–1962 Leesha ahead
• 1963–1988 Leela ahead, apart from 3 short spells
• 1991–1993 Leesha ahead
• 1994–2025 Leela ahead

9 shorter spells of a year or two are folded into the spans above rather than listed separately.

Side by side

A rank is a position within one sex’s list for one year, so the two rank rows are not subtracted from one another and the winning column is not marked on them. The living figure is a life-table estimate, not a count.

Which name is older

Half of the Leeshas alive today are over 37; half the Leelas are over 11. That is 26 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.

Both names abroad

Countries whose statistics office publishes both names, so the comparison can be made somewhere other than the United States.

Every spelling a country files separately is added together, over whatever years that country publishes — which is not the same range in any two of them, so read the columns against each other and not the rows.

Compare something else

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• Leela vs Lee
• Leela vs Leeann
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• Leela vs Leesa
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• Leesha vs Lee
• Leesha vs Leeann