How to measure kids' feet for soccer cleats

Cleats are the one piece of youth soccer kit where a half size wrong ruins the season, and they are also the item most often bought from memory — last year's size, plus one for growth. The measurement takes four minutes and it is the single highest-value thing a parent can do before clicking buy.

This page is the how. The number-to-size conversion lives on the youth soccer cleat size chart, and the question of how much room to leave is covered in how should kids' soccer cleats fit.

The method, in full

1. Pick the time of day. Feet swell over a day of standing and running, and a cleat fitted to a morning foot is tight by 4pm. Measure in the evening, or straight after a session.
2. Put the match socks on. Under Armour's own kids' buying guide says to fit with match socks on, and it matters more than it sounds — a thick soccer sock is a measurable amount of material around the foot, and a shin guard sits in there too.
3. Tape a sheet of paper to a hard floor against a wall or a door frame. Carpet lets the heel sink and skews the number.
4. Have them stand on it, not sit. Weight-bearing spreads the foot, and the foot in the cleat will be weight-bearing. A seated measurement reads short.
5. Heel flat against the wall. Then mark the paper at the tip of the longest toe. On a lot of kids the second toe is longer than the big toe, so look rather than assume.
6. Measure both feet. Most people have one foot slightly longer, and the pair has to fit the longer one.
7. Write the number down with the date. A dated measurement from three months ago tells you how fast the foot is growing, which is more useful than any single reading.

Turning the measurement into a size

Two steps, and the second is where people go wrong.

First, add room. Under Armour's guide suggests leaving about half an inch at the toe — the familiar thumb's-width rule — and that is room for the foot to move forward as it lands, not room for growth. A cleat with no room in it bruises toenails; a cleat with two sizes of room in it slides, and a sliding foot blisters.

Second, convert on a chart rather than by brand instinct. Kids' soccer cleats are unisex and sized to normal shoe size, which makes the conversion straightforward in principle — and the brands still disagree in practice. Do soccer cleats run big or small collects the behavior by brand, and the short version is that PUMA junior runs short while Nike and adidas are closer to true.

The three mistakes that cost half a size

• Sizing up for growth. This is the big one. Growing room sounds thrifty and plays badly: the heel slips, the foot slides forward on every landing, and the blisters start in week two. The American Academy of Dermatology is direct about it — shoes should fit properly, neither too tight nor too loose, because chafing is what causes blisters.
• Measuring barefoot and buying for socks. A measurement taken without the match sock is a measurement of a different foot. Take the sock into account or take it off the chart, but do not mix the two.
• Trusting the sneaker size. Sneakers run roomy and are often bought with growing room already in them, so a sneaker size is a measurement of last year's shopping, not of this year's foot.

How often to re-measure

More often than parents expect. A primary-school foot can gain a size in a season, and the gain is not evenly spread — it arrives in bursts. The practical cadence is one measurement before each season, and a quick check at the mid-season point if your kid is in a growth phase.

There are also signs that do not need a tape measure. A kid who starts taking cleats off the moment the whistle goes, who has a red mark across the top of the foot, or whose big toenail is bruised has outgrown the pair. When to replace kids' soccer cleats goes through what worn-out versus outgrown looks like, and how to break in soccer cleats covers the difference between a shoe that needs a week and a shoe that is wrong.

Width, which a tape measure will not give you

A length measurement is most of the job and not all of it. Junior soccer cleats are almost never offered in width fittings, so width is managed by choosing a model rather than by choosing a size. That is a decision the number cannot make for you.

What it can do is tell you when width is the problem. If a cleat is the right length by the chart and your kid still says it hurts across the forefoot, the shoe is too narrow rather than too short, and going up a size will make it worse by adding heel slip to the pinch. Best soccer cleats for wide feet and best youth soccer cleats for narrow feet cover the models at each end, and do soccer cleats come in wide sizes answers the question directly.

One last practical point. If you can try cleats on in a shop, do it at the same time of day you measured, in the match socks, and have your kid stand up and walk. A measurement is a very good way to narrow the choice to two models. It is not a substitute for five minutes on a foot.