Clothing Size Chart: Men's & Women's US, UK & EU Sizes
A clothing size chart is the fastest way to buy clothes online without a fitting room. Unlike shoes, clothing splits hard by gender: men's sizes come from chest and waist measurements, while women's sizes use a dress scale that shifts between US, UK, EU, French and Italian systems. Both are below, with nothing folded away.
Men's clothing chart
Chest in inches
Men's sizes are chest measurements in inches. US and UK share the same number; EU runs ten higher.
| US / UK chest (in) | EU | Letter |
|---|---|---|
| 34 | 44 | XS |
| 36 | 46 | S |
| 38 | 48 | M |
| 40 | 50 | M |
| 42 | 52 | L |
| 44 | 54 | XL |
| 46 | 56 | XXL |
| 48 | 58 | 3XL |
Women's clothing chart
Dress sizes
Women's dress sizes differ by country: the UK sits four above the US, and European systems add thirty or more.
| US dress | UK | EU | FR | IT |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | 6 | 32 | 34 | 36 |
| 4 | 8 | 34 | 36 | 38 |
| 6 | 10 | 36 | 38 | 40 |
| 8 | 12 | 38 | 40 | 42 |
| 10 | 14 | 40 | 42 | 44 |
| 12 | 16 | 42 | 44 | 46 |
| 14 | 18 | 44 | 46 | 48 |
| 16 | 20 | 46 | 48 | 50 |
| 18 | 22 | 48 | 50 | 52 |
Measuring for clothing
- 01
Chest
Wrap the tape under the armpits across the fullest part, keeping it level front to back. Arms down, breathing normally.
- 02
Waist
Measure at your natural waist, the narrowest point above the navel — not where your trousers sit.
- 03
Hips
Widest point around the seat, feet together. This decides trouser and dress sizing more than waist does.
- 04
Inseam
Crotch seam to ankle bone, standing straight. Compare with the garment's own inseam, not your body height.
Use a soft tailor's tape over thin clothing, snug but not tight. Have someone else measure you, or stand in front of a mirror: pulling the tape yourself distorts a chest or hip reading by an inch or more. Measure twice, and if the two readings differ, take the larger.
The classic errors are measuring over bulky clothes, holding the tape at an angle so it spirals instead of lying flat, and trusting an old vanity label over the tape. Every brand cuts to its own block, so one maker's medium is another's small — which is precisely why the numeric charts above beat letters.
Trousers and denim are a separate game: the number on a jeans tag is your waist in inches, not a dress size, and vanity sizing has inflated those numbers for decades. For footwear instead, use the free US to EU shoe size calculator, or pull the full shoe size conversion chart for men, women and kids.
Why country sizes drift apart
European standards such as EN 13402 describe sizing by actual body measurements in centimetres. US and UK systems evolved from older inch-based patterns and drifted over decades of separate manufacturing. The result is that a US women's 8, a UK 12, an EU 38, a FR 40 and an IT 42 can all describe the same dress. The good news is that the offsets are stable — which is exactly what the women's chart encodes.
Read next
Questions people actually ask
- Is a US clothing size the same as UK?
- For men, mostly yes — men's shirts and suits use the same numeric sizes in the US and UK. For women they differ sharply: a US dress size 8 is a UK 12, a four-size jump.
- What is a US women's 8 in UK clothing size?
- A US women's 8 is a UK 12, an EU 38, a French 40 and an Italian 42. Women's UK sizes always run four numbers above the US size.
- What is a US men's 38 in EU clothing size?
- A US 38 chest is an EU 48. For men, EU clothing sizes run ten above US/UK, so a US 40 is an EU 50 and a US 42 is an EU 52.
- Do S, M and L mean the same in every country?
- No. Letter sizes are not standardized even within a single brand, let alone across countries — an Asian-market L is often closer to a US M. Use chest and waist measurements with the numeric charts instead of letters.
- How much ease should I add to my measurements?
- None when reading a size chart: those numbers describe your body, not the garment. The brand adds the ease in the cut. Only add room yourself if you are ordering custom or made-to-measure.
Sources & method
Every number on this page is computed from a published sizing standard, then rounded to the nearest half size. Nothing here was copied from a single brand's marketing chart.
- ISO 9407 (Mondopoint)
- JP/CM size equals the measured foot length in millimeters or centimeters.
- Paris point (EU scale)
- 1 Paris point = 2/3 cm (~6.67 mm); EU size = 1.5 x foot length (cm) + 2 for a measured foot.
- Brannock device / barleycorn
- US men's = 3 x foot length (in) - 22; US women's = US men's + 1.5; 1 size = 1/3 in (8.47 mm).
- ISO/TS 19407
- Cross-size comparison table used for shoe-size conversion between systems.
- Retailer box-label convention
- Men: UK = US - 1, EU = US + 33. Women: UK = US - 2, EU = US + 30. Matches the cross-size charts from Zappos, Nordstrom and Nike.
- EN 13402 (clothing)
- EU clothing sizing standard based on body measurements.