How to Measure Hips: A Complete Guide

For garment sizing or determining weight reduction, exact hip measurements are essential. Remove your outer clothing, place your feet together, and measure the width of your hips by wrapping a soft measuring tape straight and snugly around it. When the tape’s end and remaining length meet, that is where you will find your hip measurement. This article has a complete guide that’ll assist you in knowing how to measure hips.

If you are unaware of how to measure hips, this post is for you. Continue reading to get a solution to your problem!

Table of Contents

Getting An Accurate Hip Measurement

1. Find A Full-length Body Mirror

Even though it’s simpler to measure your hips on your own than other body parts, a mirror will help you ensure the measuring tape isn’t bent or uneven. So, to get your measurement, stand in front of one.

2. Take Off Your Clothes

Take off your outerwear, such as your shirt and pants. You can measure without wearing any undergarments at all. Jeans or any other overly bulky clothing will alter the measurement.

Take Off Your Clothes for Measure Hips — Image Credits: Shutterstock

You consistently wear large clothing; you can do without removing them when measuring to see how much weight you’ve shed.

However, it’s crucial to be as precise as possible while measuring for a pattern or garment.

3. Place Your Feet Together

For the measurement, put your feet together. Your feet shouldn’t be broader than your shoulders but together is preferable. When your feet are spread apart, you can get a larger measurement than your hip area.

4. Know The Difference Between Your Waist and Your Hips

Your smallest torso part, where your body dips in, is your natural waist. Your hips are commonly wider than your waist and are below that. Both your butt and your hips are included in your hip measurement.

5. Find The Widest Point

The broadest part of your hips should be measured while getting your hip measurements. That’s because your hips, which represent the widest point on your lower half when taking measurements, accurately depict your entire body. You must find the broadest point for clothing to fit properly.

Once the tape measure is in position, you might need to adjust it up or down a few inches to find the largest area.

Because every person’s body is unique, you might need to move the tape measure a few times to be sure you’re measuring the widest area.

Using The Cloth Tape

To know how to measure hips, continue reading the next steps:

1. Hold A Cloth Tape Measure on One Hip

Keeping one end on the hip. Whichever side you begin with doesn’t matter. You could bring it closer to your middle if it’s simpler for you. Just hang onto that end as you turn the other end.

Sewing kits are often available at most big-box retailers and pharmacies. Sewing kits and craft stores sometimes provide cloth measuring tapes, which are soft and flexible tools. Most measuring tapes are only up to about five feet.

Additionally, you can print a tape measure from the internet. You need to cut them apart, line up the edges, then glue or tape them back together. Of course, using this kind of tape measure requires caution because it is extremely prone to ripping. But avoid using card stock, as it can be too stiff to acquire an accurate measurement.

Use only paper measuring tapes. Do not take measurements of your body with metal measuring tapes, such as those used for do-it-yourself home repair tasks. You won’t get an accurate measurement because they aren’t flexible enough.

Also read: 11 Transfer Tape Tips and Mistakes all Beginners Make

2. Go Around the Back

With care to prevent twisting, wrap it around your lower back. From the other hip, pull the tape all the way around to the other end. Ensure that you are also wrapping it around your behind simultaneously.

You can alternatively begin by holding both ends of the tape and step over it so that the tape is on your bottom. If you struggle to wrap it around the back, try this motion.

3. Check in the Mirror

Once you’ve wrapped it up, check in the mirror to be sure you’ve done it correctly. The tape shouldn’t be bent and should be parallel to the floor.

To view the tape’s flipside, you’ll have to turn around. So that you can see, turn to the side.

Reposition the tape measure and give it another go if it looks uneven.

4. Make It Snug

The tape should fit tightly around your hips when taking the measurement. It should be that tight. But it shouldn’t be stopping circulation. Only one finger should fit underneath it, not more.

5. Read The Measurement

You can check your size by looking down. Your measurement is where the tape measure’s end intersects a number as it turns. For easier reading of the number, you might need to glance in the mirror.

6. Write Down Your Hip Measurement

Write down your hip measurement now that you have determined it so you may save it for later use. Depending on what you’re making, you’ll also need measurements of your breast, hips, thighs, waist, and inseam when designing apparel.

The thickest area of your leg is where you measure your thigh, just like your hips.

The inseam is the inside of your leg, from the crotch to the desired bottom of your pants. Instead of measuring your body, if you already own a pair of pants that fit, you can measure the inseam.

7. Add A Few Inches When Making Clothing

Clothing isn’t made to your exact measurements because doing so would make it uncomfortable to move in and skin-tight. Therefore, add a few inches to make it more wearable.

There are two reasons why you gain inches. One is to increase the wearability of the clothes. However, you may also add inches to make a design. For instance, you might add additional inches at the hip if you want a poofy, flowing skirt rather than an a-line skirt.

Your ability to increase inches depends on how much the cloth gives. This means that you may not need to add as many inches if it is particularly stretchy.

Most patterns will guide you in deciding how many inches to add. To make it yourself, you should add 2 to 4 inches (5.1 to 10 cm), depending on how tight or lose you want your clothes to be.