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Summary
- In CDC measurements for August 2021 to August 2023, American men aged 20 and older averaged 68.9 inches, just under 5 feet 9 inches, and women 63.5 inches.
- In the 2015–2018 survey, 95 percent of adult women were 67.9 inches or shorter, so a man of 5 feet 9 inches was taller than at least 19 of every 20 women.
- In a study of U.S. dating profiles, 48.9 percent of women wanted to date only men taller than themselves, and 13.5 percent of men wanted only women shorter than themselves.
- A study of the Hadza of Tanzania found that couples paired up without regard to height, so the preference is not universal.
- When Samuel admired Eliab, God told him not to look “on the height of his stature” (1 Samuel 16:7); the Gospels describe Zacchaeus as “small in stature” (Luke 19:3).
- No passage of Scripture sets a height for a husband or a wife.
Bibliography (Click to show)
- Scripture quotations from the English Standard Version (1 Samuel 9:2; 10:24; 15:23; 16:6–7, 11–12; Luke 19:3–5; Matthew 6:27; Song of Solomon 7:7; Proverbs 31:30; 1 Peter 3:3–4; Ruth 3:11) and the King James Version (Matthew 6:27).
- Fryar, C. D., Q. Gu, J. Afful, M. D. Carroll and C. L. Ogden, Anthropometric Reference Data for Children and Adults: United States, August 2021–August 2023, Vital and Health Statistics, Series 3, No. 50 (National Center for Health Statistics, 2025). https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_03/sr03-050.pdf
- Fryar, C. D., M. D. Carroll, Q. Gu, J. Afful and C. L. Ogden, Anthropometric Reference Data for Children and Adults: United States, 2015–2018, Vital and Health Statistics, Series 3, No. 46 (National Center for Health Statistics, 2021). https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_03/sr03-046-508.pdf
- National Center for Health Statistics, FastStats: Body Measurements. https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/body-measurements.htm
- Yancey, George, and Michael O. Emerson, “Does Height Matter? An Examination of Height Preferences in Romantic Coupling,” Journal of Family Issues 37, no. 1 (2016): 53–73, first published online 2014. https://doi.org/10.1177/0192513X13519256
- Rice University, “Is height important in matters of the heart? New study says yes,” ScienceDaily, 10 February 2014. https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/02/140210114542.htm
- Sear, Rebecca, and Frank W. Marlowe, “How universal are human mate choices? Size does not matter when Hadza foragers are choosing a mate,” Biology Letters 5, no. 5 (2009): 606–609. https://doi.org/10.1098/rsbl.2009.0342
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