How to Measure Your Hands for Gloves

When choosing a pair of safety gloves, your main consideration should be the protection they provide, and how well suited they are to your particular needs. Once you've found the perfect pair of gloves, the most important thing to do is to make sure that you've selected the right size to ensure effective protection and optimal comfort during use. We want to make choosing gloves as simple as possible here at SafetyGloves.co.uk, so we've provided a quick breakdown on How to Measure Your Hands for Gloves to help you to feel confident that you're choosing the best fit.

If you think a visual demonstration will help, check out the video below for a guide to the various methods of measuring for gloves, and discover some top tips for choosing the right glove size.

What Does THis Guide Cover?

• Why Is Glove Sizing So Important?
• What Should I Use to Measure My Hands?
• How Do I Measure My Hands for Gloves?
• Top Tips for Choosing a Glove Size

Why Is Glove Sizing So Important?

You may think that there's no problem wearing a pair of gloves that's a size too large or small, but the fit of your glove can have a significant effect on how they work for you. Here's what a perfectly sized glove can do for you:

• Better Protection – Many safety gloves and work gloves are designed to provide better protection with reinforcement on particular parts of your hands. If you select the perfect glove size, you'll know that you're protected where you need to be.
• Better Grip – The grippy areas of your gloves are placed where they are for a reason, and these areas can often be targeted to small regions of your fingers and palms. With the right size of gloves, you'll be able to grip what you need to, when you want to.
• Better Feel – Many handling gloves, including disposable gloves, are designed to provide a fine touch with close control. If your gloves are overly baggy or tight, you won't benefit from the same effortless feel.
• Better Fit – This one seems obvious, but it's important enough to mention. A loose-fitting glove may slip around on your hand, and can even risk falling off at the most crucial moment. A properly fitting glove will stay on your hands, without any loose fabric that could get caught on errant objects and corners.

What Should I Use to Measure My Hands?

There are various measuring tools that you can use to measure the different parts of your hands. When trying to identify your glove size, we would recommend choosing a flexible measuring option such as tailor's tape to ensure accurate and precise measurements.

You can also use a piece of string, which can be tied or cut to size and then measured with a straight ruler. While this is a great option for those who do not have a flexible tape option, it is important to note that this method leaves a larger margin for error.

How Do I Measure My Hands for Gloves?

While glove manufacturers will often vary in their specific sizing, almost all will require you to take the same measurements of your hands. These measurements are:

• Hand Circumference: To measure the circumference of your hand, you must measure around the entire circumference of the area (excluding the thumb), so that the tape forms a sort of circle around your knuckles.
• Hand Length - To find your hand length, you will need to measure the distance from the tip of your middle finger to the end of your hand, where your wrists begins.
• Knuckle Width - To measure knuckle width, you will need a measure across your knuckles on the back of your hand. Ensure that you are excluding your thumb when measuring knuckle width. 
• Finger Width - To measure finger width, you will need to measure across your four fingers (once again excluding your thumb), from the top of the little finger to your index finger. 

Top Tips for choosing A Glove SIze

Follow these top tips to ensure a good glove fit:

• Some gloves offer a fairly tight fit, including thermal-lined gloves such as the Ejendals Tegera 295 Waterproof Thermal Work Gloves. Look out for a notice on the sizing guide on our gloves that highlights these tighter glove models, and choose a size larger than your hand measurements suggest you need to ensure a good fit.
• ALWAYS check the sizing chart included in the glove listing. While you may know your glove size based on EN 420 sizing, there will be some differences in sizing and fit between different brands and models.
• If you are planning to use a glove liner with your gloves, purchase a size larger than your measurement suggests to account for the extra bulk
• One-size gloves (or gloves with universal sizing) tend to offer a looser fit to ensure comfort. If you generally wear smaller glove sizes, we would recommend avoiding universally sized gloves, and instead choosing an option with specific sizing to ensure a good fit.

A Glove for Every Hand

At SafetyGloves.co.uk, we try to make it as easy as possible to choose the perfect glove size for you. Almost all of our gloves feature a sizing chart, showing you which size to select based on the four measurements we've outlined above. If you're having trouble finding a glove for your hands and requirements, don't hesitate to contact our Customer Care Team at 020 7501 1104, where we'll be happy to provide you with a recommendation.

Have any questions about our glove sizing, or anything to add? Let us know in the comments below, or find us on Facebook and Twitter!