Bailee

About Bailee

Bailee is an English spelling of Bailey, a surname name meaning “bailiff.” It is pronounced BAY-lee and has become established as a girl’s name in the United States. Actor Bailee Madison is a notable bearer, connecting this exact spelling with family films and television.

Meaning and surname history

Bailey comes from an English occupational surname based on Middle English baili, meaning “bailiff.” The surname identifies an office or occupation, placing it alongside other personal names that began as descriptions of someone’s work.

Bailee changes the surname’s ending while keeping the same pronunciation. Bailey, Bayley, and Baylee belong to the same group of spellings. Bailee’s double e makes its long final vowel particularly visible.

The wider Bailey name has been used for both boys and girls. In the United States, television helped make the familiar spelling more prominent: the female character Bailey Quarters appeared in WKRP in Cincinnati beginning in 1978, while Bailey Salinger was a male character in Party of Five, which began in 1994.

Those characters belong to Bailey’s history. Bailee has a separate statistical record and its own recognizable bearer in Madison, so its popularity does not need to be treated as identical to the other spelling’s.

Bailee Madison on screen

Bailee Madison played May Belle in Bridge to Terabithia, bringing the name into a film based on a well-known children’s story. Her early work also included the family comedy Parental Guidance.

In television, she played Grace in Good Witch. Other work included Trophy Wife and The Fosters, and she appeared as Maxine in Wizards of Waverly Place. These roles place the name across family-oriented fantasy, comedy, and drama.

Madison’s public work has also included support for Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation, a childhood cancer charity. Variety honoured her through its Power of Youth initiative in 2011, and she became a national youth spokesperson for the foundation in 2012.

This gives Bailee a specific cultural history beyond its place among spelling variants: a childhood screen career that developed into further television work, together with a documented charitable association.

Pronunciation and related spellings

Bailee has two syllables, BAY-lee, with the emphasis at the beginning. The sound remains the same as Bailey in ordinary English pronunciation. Neither the ai nor the final ee adds a separate syllable.

Bailey preserves the familiar surname spelling. Baylee substitutes ay at the beginning, while Bayley changes both vowel groups. These are closely related written forms, unlike other names that simply happen to end in -lee.

American popularity

Bailee’s largest annual American total for girls was 658 in 2000, when it ranked #429. In 2025, 227 girls received the name, placing it at #1,069.

Its strongest year therefore came around the turn of the millennium, before Madison’s best-known early films. The name’s American use extends beyond the later visibility of its famous bearer.

How popular is Bailee?

In 2025, Bailee ranked #1,069 among girls in the United States, with 227 recorded uses. The U.S. birth records first list this spelling for girls in 1982; its largest annual count was 658 in 2000. Rankings count each spelling separately. They describe national use, so local familiarity can differ. The popularity chart shows whether the name has remained common, returned after a quieter period, or risen recently.