Height is one of the most commonly talked about dating topics. Unlike ones facial attractiveness, ones height is perfectly measurable. This of course makes it an obsession of men.

Despite the large discussion of height I don’t think most men have a true understanding of how height affects their dating life.

How much of a disadvantage are short men at? How much of an advantage is being tall? What is the ideal height for men? Are women’s height preferences related to their own height? And is there anything you can do to take advantage of the role height plays in dating?

In this article I’ll be answering all these questions and more, leaving you with a full in-depth understanding of the role height plays on the dating market.

Let’s start with the basics…

Being short is more of a disadvantage than being tall is an advantage.

Because height is so measurable theres actually a pretty large amount of data on this. The first piece were going to look at is this chart posted by OkCupid in 2010.

As you can see this chart shows the height preferences of men and women on OkCupid. The first thing I want to draw your attention to is that once you get above average each additional inch doesn’t make that much of a difference.

On OkCupid the difference between being 5’9”(the national average) and 6’2”(5” over the national average) is a 17% increase in unsolicited messages. Showing being tall is nice, but not really that much of an advantage.

The difference between being 5’4”(5” below the national average) and being 5’9” is a 66% increase in unsolicited messages. Showing that, unfortunately for some, being short is a big disadvantage in the dating market.

Being extremely tall is also a disadvantage in online dating with men above 6’7” receiving a similar amount of messages to men around 5’6”. Although in my real life experience these men seem to do fine due to being fetishized by a minority of women, while having so little competition for the women fetishizing them due to their rarity.

Now the next thing you need to understand about heights affect on the dating market is that…

Women’s height preferences are relative to their own height.

It’s seems intuitive that this would be true, and the data backs it up. For my money the best study on online dating is that 2010 study ‘What makes you click? Mate preferences in online dating’ which looked at 22000 different profiles data to find out what makes people attracted to each other.

They found that it’s a definitive certainty that on average women’s height preferences are relative to their own height.

The results from the study show that being noticeably taller than a woman(2”-5”) will massively increase your chances with a women relative to being the same height or shorter, and being significantly taller(5”+) is even more advantageous although not quite the jump tall men would hope for.

Although it is worth noting that as women get taller they get less stingy about how much taller than themselves their man needs to be. I came across a video by a man that goes by single steve who discussed the data he found mining the dating platform Match.com.

Essentially the average 5’1” women will on average have a minimum standard of the man being 6” taller than her(5’7”) while the average 5’9” women will have a minimum standard of the man being 2” taller than her(5’11”). So yes all heights of women on average have a minimum height threshold of taller than themselves, but taller women are less stingy about how much taller.

What is the ideal male height?

Technically it’s going to depend on the height of the woman you’re interested in. As height preferences are relative to ones own height, shorter women will prefer still tall, but not very tall men, while tall women will prefer very tall men.

According to a speed dating study out of the USA with 5786 participants the exact amount taller women preferred men to be was 25.1cm(10”) taller than themselves.

but I’m sure you want to know what the best overall height to be is…

The overall most attractive height.

According to the speed dating study I mentioned earlier the height that received the overall most positive responses were men in the 188-195cm(6’2”-6’5”) range.

The ‘What makes you click? Mate preferences in online dating’ study found a super similar result with the 6’3”-6’4” range having the most success followed by similar results from the 6’1-6’2” and 6’5”-6’6” ranges.

As additional evidence if we can look at adult romance novels. These novels are written by women for women so they give us a pretty good incite into what women really fantasize about.

The site girlpowerstrong.com looked at 1000 romance novels written by women with all books being released after the year 2000 to keep thing up to the times. Out of the 1000 books read 267 of them mentioned a specific height, not just tall.

The average height of a male love interest in the books sampled was 6’3” with 6’2” being the most common. The 6’ to 6’6” range took up 79% of the variance, and the 6’2” to 6’4” range took up 39%. I’ll also again point out the 6’8”+ group does have their niche.

Leading me to the conclusion the optimal male height for dating is anything in the 6’2”-6’5” range, quibbling over a one number answer seems pretty pointless as the difference between any of these seem marginal if existent at all, but if god asked you what height you wanted to be 6’3.5” seems like a good pick.

How Does Your Height Affect Your Dating Life as a Man?

The obvious answer is it will depend on how tall you are.

Very Short(5'4” or shorter) - Bottom 5th Percentile: Every piece of data I’ve come across says you guys have it really tough. I’m not here to be a doomer, and I don’t think any one should give up, exceptions exist, but I understand as well as I’m sure you do you’re going to have to work a lot harder for the same results as taller men.

Short(5’5”-5’7”) - 5th-25th Percentile: You’re definitely at a disadvantage, but if you got enough other stuff going on you should be able to do well for yourself. Online dating will be more difficult as 65-85% of women with a height filter set will filter you out at this height. I highly recommend reading the Actionable Tips section below as each inch makes a huge difference here.

Average(5'8”-5’10”) - 25th- 66th Percentile: You guys are fine, no need to worry. Each inch taller here does matter, increasing your online dating pool from 40% of women to 80%, so I highly recommend reading the Actionable Tips section below. Overall, you’re not at much of a disadvantage here though, unless you really like taller women. The data says in the USA being anything around 5’8”+ leaves you in a solid spot.

Tall(5’11”-6’1”) - 66th - 90th Percentile: There’s basically no women filtering you out because of your height at this point and you will be in the optimal height range for shorter women. The advantages really start to taper off after this so you’re lucky in that sense.

Very Tall(6’2”-6’5”) - 90th-99.8th Percentile: You are in the optimal height range for dating, so congratulations. Unfortunately for you this doesn’t guarantee you a girlfriend, but it does mean almost no one is filtering you out because of your height, and you get a big advantage with taller women who are filtering most men out.

Extremely Tall(6’6” or taller) - Top 99.8th Percentile: As I’m sure everyone points out to you, you are extremely tall. At this point you are getting filtered out by some women, especially past 6’7”, but not that many. The main thing here though is you get a massive advantage with tall women and certain women who fetishize height. Overall you should be chilling.

Actionable Tips

Actionable Tip for Average or Shorter Men: If you are average or on the shorter side you should go after shorter women. Every piece of data out there says you’re success rate will be higher.

Actionable Tip for Taller Men: If you are on the taller side(6’2”+) and still struggling you should try going after taller women. Taller women on average have higher height standards, and taller men are rare, therefore you have less competition, and will have a higher success rate with taller women than you will with shorter women. You will do fine with shorter women though.

Actionable Tip for Everyone: Do you’re best to appear taller. I already have an article on the best height boosting shoes and where to wear them here. This will help you appear taller in real life. Online I recommend listing your in-shoe height on dating apps rather than your barefoot height if you’re under 6’2”. It will give you an edge most men are already taking advantage of. On average men lie by about 2” on online daitng sites/apps.

Conclusion

As most people know height is 80%+ genetic and once you’re over the age of 18 there isn’t much you can do to change how tall you are. It’s one of the seemingly most unfair factors of dating as it is basically unchangeable, but it is the world we live in.

You can’t change the rules of the dating, only learn to navigate them, and I hope this article has helped you do so. See you next Thursday.