How long should women's pants be? Lengths by style

Proper pants length for each style

Tailored trousers with a straight or slightly wide leg are the classic case. The front of the hem rests lightly on the top of your shoe, with at most a soft fold, and the back falls to about half an inch above the floor, covering most of the heel. That half inch keeps the hem from dragging while still making the leg look long. Menswear inspired trousers in wool can take a slightly fuller fold at the front, the look tailors call a break; our guide to dress pants length explains the terms.

Wide leg and flared pants are usually worn longer, because the fabric needs length to fall well. Many stylists aim for a hem about a quarter to half an inch above the floor, so only the toe of the shoe shows. Cut them shorter and the wide opening can look like a mistake rather than a choice. Bootcut pants fall in between: long enough to cover most of the shoe, with room at the opening for a boot or heel to slip underneath.

Straight leg pants and jeans can end at the top of the foot or just at the bottom of the ankle, with little or no fold. Slim and skinny pants look best at or just above the ankle bone; if they are longer, the fabric bunches around the ankle, which works with some casual jeans but looks untidy with trousers. Ankle pants are meant to end at or just above the ankle bone, showing a little skin between hem and shoe. Cropped pants and culottes end higher, somewhere between the lower calf and a few inches above the ankle, and what matters is that the length looks deliberate.

Flats or heels: your shoes change the length

The same pair of trousers cannot be the perfect length with both flats and heels. A hem that just clears the floor in a 3 inch heel will drag on the ground in flats, and a hem cut for flats will look short with heels. Decide which shoes you will wear most with each pair and hem for those, and wear those exact shoes to the fitting. If you split your time evenly, a mid height block heel or a low boot is a sensible compromise, or you can keep one pair hemmed for heels and another for flats.

Ankle, cropped and slim pants are the exception, because they end above the shoe and so work with any heel height. For that reason an ankle length trouser is often the most versatile pair in a work wardrobe. Wide leg pants are the least forgiving, since the full length matters so much to their shape; see our guide to styling wide leg trousers for shoe pairings that suit each length.

Inseam length by height, and why it is only a guide

Pant length on a label is the inseam, measured from the crotch seam to the hem along the inside of the leg. Height is a rough predictor of the inseam you need, but leg length, rise and shoes all shift it, so treat any chart as a starting point. As a loose guide for full length pants worn with low shoes, women around 5 feet 2 inches often land somewhere around 27 to 28 inches, women around 5 feet 5 around 29 to 30 inches, and women 5 feet 8 or taller around 31 to 33 inches. Add an inch or more for heels, and subtract several inches for ankle and cropped styles.

Brands handle this with length categories. Lands' End, for example, cuts petite for about 4 feet 11 to 5 feet 3, regular for 5 feet 4 to 5 feet 7 and tall for 5 feet 8 to 6 feet; petite pants are usually shorter in the rise as well as the leg. Levi's sells women's jeans in 28, 30 and 32 inch lengths. So is a 32 inch inseam long for a woman? For most women under about 5 feet 8, yes, in flats; it suits taller women, or wide leg and flared pants worn with heels. The most reliable number is your own: measure the inseam of a pair whose length you like, in the shoes you wear with them.

Pants length for petite and tall women

If you are around 5 feet 2 or shorter, almost every regular length pant will need hemming, so shop petite ranges where they exist, since a shorter rise and a knee placed higher on the leg fit better than a regular pair cut off at the bottom. Very wide or flared pants can lose their proportions when shortened a lot, because they were drawn for a longer leg; a straight or slightly wide leg usually hems more successfully. Ankle length pants are especially useful, because a regular ankle pant often becomes a full length pant on a shorter frame.

Tall women face the opposite problem: regular pants often stop above the ankle, which reads as too short rather than cropped. Look for tall ranges or brands that sell long inseams, check whether the hem has extra fabric that a tailor can let down, and remember that a longer rise matters as much as leg length for comfort at the waist.

Hemming: telling a tailor, or doing it yourself

Bring the shoes, wear the underwear and belt you usually wear, and stand naturally while the tailor pins; slouching or looking down changes the length. Say where you want the hem to fall, for example half an inch off the floor at the back in these heels, rather than asking for a number. Ask for the back of wide or straight pants to be slightly longer than the front if you want the hem to cover the heel. For jeans, you can ask to keep the original hem so the worn edge stays.

Hemming at home is manageable with a straight leg, as our guide on how to hem pants explains. Before you cut anything, wash cotton pants once if they have not been washed, since cotton can shrink; Lands' End advises allowing an extra half inch for shrinkage in 100 percent cotton pants. And when in doubt, it is always better to buy pants that are slightly too long, because a hem can be taken up easily while a short pant can only be let down if there is enough fabric turned under.