Start from the range the maker publishes for that model, which is given against your weight — then move within it according to what the ski is for. This site prints those ranges and does not turn them into a single number, because the same skier wants different lengths in different skis.
What the length actually changes
A longer ski has more edge on the snow. That means more grip at speed, more stability in rough snow and more float in soft snow — and more effort to bring round, more swing weight, and more ski to manage in a lift queue.
A shorter ski is the opposite on every count.
Neither is a level of ability. A heavy skier on a short ski is over-flexing it; a light skier on a long one cannot bend it at all. Weight is the input, which is why makers publish their ranges against it.
Why the number moves with the ski
The same person is correctly on different lengths in different skis:
- A piste ski is generally taken shorter, because grip comes from the edge and the sidecut rather than from length.
- An all-mountain ski sits in the middle.
- A powder or freeride ski is taken longer, because float comes from surface area.
- A touring ski is often taken shorter again, since every centimetre is carried uphill.
So a single “your length” does not exist. The published range for the model in front of you does.
The figure that matters more
Between two lengths of the same ski, the difference is real but modest. Between two waist widths, the difference is what snow the ski is for. Anyone choosing on length alone is choosing on the smaller of the two variables.
What nobody publishes
How a given length flexes under you. Flex is what decides whether a ski holds or washes out, it varies with construction, and almost no maker publishes it as a number.
How this site prints it
Every ski page prints the lengths offered, the maker’s weight range where one is published, and the three widths and the radius for the length reviewed — because those change at every length. Where a maker publishes one set of figures for a whole range, the page says so instead of implying the numbers hold throughout.
Where this page and a maker’s own documentation part company, the documentation is right. Every length, waist width, radius, flex index, last width, DIN range, brake width, filter category, temperature band and mass on this page comes from the maker’s own published figures, with the unit as printed and the source named. None of it is measured here, and no figure is converted into another convention, because a converted number is a different number. And the distinction this page keeps: a flex index describes the boot, not the person in it. No standards body defines the scale, no test produces a comparable figure between two makers, and the same number stiffens in the cold. This page reports the figure, names the maker who published it, and never ranks two boots on it alone.
The questions asked most often
Is the chin-to-forehead rule wrong?
It is a rough starting point from an era of straighter, narrower skis. It ignores weight, which matters more, and it ignores what the ski is for, which matters as much.
Does a beginner want a shorter ski?
Shorter skis turn more easily and are less stable at speed, which is why a first pair is often at the low end of the range a maker publishes. That is the maker’s range, not a rule of ours.
Last reviewed 28 September 2026