Do women really rule out average height men, or is it online talk?

[Uravinalaugh]

My younger step brother who is 19 [I am male btw], told me that women only want to date much taller men, he's roughly the same height as me, 5'7 [5'9 in thicker soled trainers lol], and is very introvert and hasn't had any dating experience, he has a few friends and I have noticed girls in the past being nice to him/liking him when I have seen him socializing. I was aware of this height bias which shows up quite a lot online and on social media, even here on mumsnet I have seen dating related threads where many women appear to be very dismissive of dating shorter men [used to nose sometimes using my OHs old account ,she didn't mind ahaha]

Because of this, I have been noticing often when I am out in public the heights of men to see if this is true, and it very clearly isn't. Last weekend I went to a well known seaside town for the day, due to the weather it was packed so millions of people and I would say literally the amount of couples of all ages where the man was average/slightly shorter than average height was the majority, it very clearly isn't the case that most women are not attracted to men below 6ft, 5ft10 or whatever. I myself have also never had a huge issue dating in the past, I never even knew I was particularly short until seeing this height related stuff online, and where women are concerned my height has never been mentioned

Was curious if this is only me that's noticed this, I think it could be more of a gen z thing than millenial and above? I'm not sure, but it definitely doesn't seem to match up with what I have seen with my own eyes in real life, have tried to reassure step bro that his height is fine, I think his parents have too, but don't seem to be able to convince him

And that’s including the ethnic minorities who have much smaller heights who significantly lower the average, and those with poor nutrition in childhood which restricts growth by 2 inches on average per my earlier posts. In the absence of these factors, the average height of a young man now is over 6 feet.

I wouldn't date someone shorter than me because I feel too tall at 5'7 anyway. My DH is 5'9. Many women are only 5'4 average so if imagine 5'7 is a good height for women to go for. I'm not sure it's true that women will only date 6foot and over. Internet bullshit

Yes it’s all terribly unfair of these
horrible women. Particularly as we all
know men don’t judge women on their looks and age at all do they?!?

Virtue? 😆

No they aren’t. The average height for young women in the UK with northern European genetics and not medical conditions/ malnutition stunting growth is 5’8”. So while I agree of course nobody should be made to feel guilty for who they fancy (the Equality Act doesn’t apply to dating!! 😆) please could people stop stating that the average height of women in Britain is 5’4”. That’s only the case if you include the elderly, people with very severe health conditions impacting growth, or those raised in poverty with malnutrition, or you are looking at someone from populations from very specific ethnic communities that have genetics making them much smaller than the vast majority of UK citizens. It misrepesents the situation to apply those very specific cases to the entire population.

Who are all these giants who walk among us? Or do you all just live in afluent areas?
I'm in my 40s and 5'9. I am taller than most of the people - men and women - where I live. To the point where I'm actually quite excited if I meet a woman my height.
There was 1 bloke taller than me in the gym class this weekend. But he's early 30s. No one was my height on my run today.

Dd is 5'4. She claims she's not short, as she's taller than lots of her year group (yr9). She's short.

Really? Where you live almost all men are under 5”9. Sounds implausible considering the ‘average’ male height is 5’9 and that’s including previous generations who are much shorter.

I would 100% ‘notice’ if a man were under 5”10

I tend to wear very thick soled trainers that put me up two inches so when I'm out and about in public where most people see me i'm very close to average height. Some people can call me insecure but I see it as the male equivalent of women wearing makeup, botox, push up bras etc😅

The average height of men where I’m from is 6ft 🤷🏻‍♀️

I’m about 5 ft 3.5 inch and I like men who are taller than me, but preferably BELOW 6ft. My ex was 6ft 2 and the height difference was too big. Basically, my preference would be anyone between 5 ft 5 and 6 ft…but tbh I wouldn’t let height stand in the way of a great man. I am Gen Z (just).

My dad was 5’7 and by all accounts a successful ‘ladies man’.

Yes, the reason for my concern, I spoke to him today and I think he is actually closer to 5ft9 as he's slightly taller than me, not much, so still slightly on the shorter side for a lad his age but at the same time its not extremely rare to see boys his age who are the same height as him either, i'm aware his generation are getting taller, compared even to my slightly older generation, but I don't believe that will hold him back as much as social media and the internet makes it sound like. Being 5ft9 as a late teens/young adult male is not a death sentence where dating and relationships is concerned, but seeing certain things online you'd think it would be

Yes, I'm wondering the same thing, a few posts on here have highlighted the fact that i'm well below average height for a man my age, yet when I'm out very much feel I blend in, in that I don't feel tall, but not noticeably short at the same, both in and out of thick soled trainers, and its also not uncommon that I come across men the same height as me, including white men my own age group [30s]. I see a lot of men taller than me and a lot of men the same height, and the odd few shorter

Below 5'6 is where I feel shortness would become noticeable in a man, I feel like i'm just passed that point where it becomes noticeable, but if I had been an inch or two shorter it would be. I remember being in an area of London at a bus stop on a busy high street about a year ago with a heavily Indian population, and for the first time ever I actually felt quite tall!

It’s because you’re a man and hence are blessed with over confidence about yourself. You’re short. End of

I don't mind shorter men, DH is the same height as me but in the past I have been out with men that were maybe 5'6". Nothing wrong with wearing thick soled trainers and yes I probably would think you were around the same height as me, I always feel noticeably taller than most women by about 6 inches especially amongst my older age group.

I’m 5’1 my DH is 5’7 or 5’8. I’d hate if he was any taller

So were allowed to argue if its fair or unfair that some women are recently, openly, stating a preference for men over 6' tall.
Why have we not been having this argument in reverse for..decades..maybe longer? Why is it still ok for so many men to be prejudiced / uneasy or probably more like silently refusing, to date women taller than they are?
Is this not actually allowing one group to hold a discriminatory prejudice and not the other?

Its very obvious by your attitude you don't like short men, its water off a ducks back to me as my height has had no noticeable negative effect on me as I stated in my post and why i'm wondering what all this is about regarding height, and clearly I'm being delusional knowing and seeing all those men my age who are my height and close to it on a near daily basis..

Fortunately going by own experience and some posts on this thread its evident that there are more than enough women who don't have an issue with height despite the bs spouted online, my brother is a kind, compassionate and hard working young men and they are the traits in someone that are more important than being able to reach something off a high shelf in a supermarket. Luckily he will know that any girl who is interested in him really is interested in him and isn't just interested in him for a physical trait that end of the end means absolutely nothing, save for initial five minute foot in the door attraction, and he will have dodged a bullet being passed over by the girls with your mindset.

This whole thing regarding mens height appears to have only come up recently in the last few years since social media has become so prevalent, I never used to hear it spoken about anything like as much, I assume its the same where womens dating/body issues are concerned as well. Personally height in a woman means nothing to me attraction wise, the same as body weight, as long as its not thin/overweight to an extreme degree

Do you judge potential partners on their looks op? I don’t understand how this is any different? Seems misogynistic to me ok for men to do but when done back at them
they don’t like it 🙄

It’s been around since I was dating 30+ years ago, my Dad was tall and my Mum who is short said all her average sized friends ended up with short blokes- so I think it’s always been around. It affects much more than just dating.

The same could be said for any woman on earth. Nobody likes to be rejected. How is that misogyny fgs

Where are you getting that data from?

I've looked it up out of interest, and I can find very little so far on height by age. The I've found this for actual heights - 'Our World In Data', which says that UK females born in 1996 are on average 164.4 cm at age 18, in 2014. So 5'3.9".

Meanwhile, the NHS says:

Between 1993 and 2019, mean height increased by slightly more than 1cm among men, and by half that much among women. In 2019, the mean heights of men and women based on measured values were 175.5cm and 161.7cm, respectively.

So while that includes all ages, it does make it seem as though there aren't any new young adults ageing into the measurements and skewing heights notably taller.

And the WHO Growth Charts for the UK show that the 50th centile for 18-year-old girls is 164 cm, with anything over 172 CMS (or 5'7") being 91st centile.

Personally, I'm not in the UK (NZ) but our height trends are similar (we skew about half a cm taller) and at 5ft 8, I'm taller than all of my daughter's 15-year-old female friends, as well as my son's 18-year-old female friends (although a few are very close to my height, and one is pretty much the same height). I only know a handful of young women who are taller than me, and few who are my height.

Ditto for young men - it seems as though the average for young men has gone up by just over a centimetre, maybe creeping closer to 5'10", but nothing dramatic.

So I'd be very surprised if the average height for young adult females in the UK was 5'8". Although I'd be interested to be proven wrong!

Additionally, I did just find this random blog post on a shorter man's clothing site (so take it with a grain of salt) that says the average height of men in the UK aged 16 to 24 is 5'10.4, compared to a man of 70, which is 5'8.2.

The shorter older man would be due both to shrinking in old age, and slightly shorter initial height, but young men are still not hitting 6 ft on average it seems. The centile charts I linked in my other comment show that at 18, when most have finished growing save for a few extra cms, anything over 182 cms (5'9.7) is the 75th centile, and anything over 186 cms (6'1").

This again is what I generally notice day to day - most men are only a few inches taller than me at most (so 5'9 to 5'11), and in a crowd my DH and son (both 6'3) stick out like sore thumbs - very easy to spot above the others!

Bloody hell if there were men out there who refused to date me because of my height I never would have guessed. I was beating them off with a stick when I was younger and cuter. My DH is a few inches shorter.