Josephine Lee was born on February 3, 2008 in Newport Beach, California, United States. Her mother, Caroline Tseng, is a Taiwanese attorney and her father, Jay Lee, is an applications developer. Lee also has a younger brother, Jonathan.
She is currently a student at California Connection Academy. Lee aspires to attend medical school and become a plastic surgeon following her figure skating career.
Career
Early years
Lee began skating at the age of four when her dad took her to a rink near his office. According to her, she fell in love with the challenge the sport gave her. Her first coaches were Vitali Novikov and Shannon Pecca. At the age of twelve, she began training under Amy Evidente.
In 2019, she experienced a stress fracture in her spine due to an overuse injury.
2021–2022 season: Junior international debut
Lee made her international debut on the Junior Grand Prix series, finishing eighth at 2021 JGP France. She then went on to make her national debut at the 2022 U.S. Junior Championships, winning the bronze medal. Lee later said, "[That result was] when I realised that it started to get serious and I can actually go somewhere."
2022–2023 season
Going into the season, Lee was assigned to two Grand Prix events, both in Poland. At the end of September, she finished ninth at the 2022 JGP Solidarity Cup and the following week, placed seventh at the 2022 JGP Baltic Cup.
In January, Lee made her senior national debut at the 2023 U.S. Championships. She placed eleventh in the short program and fourth in the free skate to finish in fifth place overall. Selected to compete at the 2023 World Junior Championships the following month, Lee placed fourteenth in the short program and twenty-first in the free skate to finish in nineteenth place overall.
2023–2024 season: U.S. national silver
Going into the season, Lee underwent a significant growth spurt which she later acknowledged to be a challenging adjustment. She began her season on the junior level by winning the bronze medal at the 2023 Cranberry Cup. Three weeks later, she competed at the 2023 JGP in Austria, finishing in eighth place overall.
In January, Lee competed on the senior level at the 2024 U.S. Championships. After placing fifth in the short program segment, Lee went on to win the free skate and capture the silver medal. Regarding her placement, Lee said, "I cried like three times. After my free skate, my (fake) eyelashes fell off because I cried them off. I was crying so much, but I was also trying to cover my face so no one could see the eyelashes falling off...I didn’t know where I would place. Going into this event, I had no expectations. After my long program, I expected maybe, at most, fourth, so I was just really happy with how I did. I didn’t really think about my placement at the time."
Going on to compete at the 2024 World Junior Championships, garnering new season's best scores across all competition segments and finishing twentieth overall. Following her free skate, Lee shared, "I didn’t expect to come here as I had a pretty rough start of the season. I went into Nationals thinking it would be my last event and just wanted to show what I can do. I want to approach this event the same way."
In January, Lee concluded her season with a seventh-place finish at the 2025 U.S. Championships. She said afterward, "I'm really relieved that I just got through everything coming into this competition, I had pneumonia, like a week and a half ago, so I just had, like, one week of training, so I was a little worried that I wouldn’t be able to get through this program. But thankfully, I got through, and I did a lot more than I expected."
Selected as one of the host picks for 2025 Skate America, Lee made her senior Grand Prix debut at the event where she placed twelfth in both the short program and free skate segments to finish in twelfth place overall.
In January, Lee competed at the 2026 U.S. Championships. After placing eighth in the short program, she struggled throughout her free skate where she fell three times and received a number of under-rotation and downgrade calls from the technical panel. She ultimately placed eighteenth in that competition segment, dropping to sixteenth place overall.
United States
