Given name & surname
Leili
“vapour or soul”
Leili is a feminine given name. It is used in Estonian.
Meaning & origin
What it means
Leili goes back to a word meaning “vapour or soul.”
Adapted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0)
The story
Published U.S. birth records include this spelling as early as 1998. This is the earliest published observation available here, rather than a date for the name’s origin.
From dated birth records
Leili through the years
- Babies since 1880
- 122
- 0 boys · 122 girls
- Most popular year
- 2020
- 11 babies
- 2025
- 5
- #16,281 for girls
- 2021–25 vs 2016–20
- −42%
- Cooling
By the numbers
In 2025, this name appeared in 5 U.S. birth records for girls, ranking No. 16,281 among girls’ names. The recent annual counts are too incomplete to establish a ten-year comparison. Published U.S. population figures for this spelling include 324 as a first name in 2020; 102 as a surname in 2020.
From Social Security birth records and U.S. Census name counts for this exact spelling. Other spellings are counted separately.
Leili’s family of names
In Estonian usage, Leili has a related form in Leila.
The ring: nicknames and forms.
Nicknames & forms 1
Diminutives, pet forms, short forms and variants used alongside the name.
People named Leili
- Leili PärnpuuEstonian chess player (1950–2022)
- Leili AnvarFrench Iranist academic, writer and translatorborn 1967
- Leyli RashidiIranian actressborn 1973
Listed by how widely each person is written about, which says nothing about the name itself.
Similar names
If you love Leili, these share its style, era, origin or sound, from outside its own family.