As anyone who’s petite knows, it’s not easy finding a pair of jeans that fit your proportions. I’m petite (5’3”, to be exact), so I know that even when I shop savvy, say, by perusing the best jeans for women according to our editors, I can wind up with skinny jeans that leave me with pooled fabric at my ankles, or sagging fanny fabric because I didn’t choose the best jeans for a flat butt. These and other woes—like fading and tailoring that hits at the wrong place on our legs—arise when slipping on denim that wasn’t designed for my frame. But I’m thinking, enough! Short queens like Simone Biles would never accept such lackluster fits! So neither am I. My colleagues, PureWow’s petite editors, tested and reviewed the best jeans for short women—as well as intel sourced from top denim designers.
Here’s a quick rule of thumb for petites I learned from our experts: Focus on the inseam first, which is the actual length of the jeans’ leg itself. For those on the shorter side, an inseam of 26 inches or less is the most ideal. However, if you like to wear your denim with heels, you can go for a slightly longer inseam. “At Joe’s Jeans, we consider full-length petite to be a 31-inch inseam, which can be worn with heels without dragging on the ground,” says the brand’s senior women’s denim designer, Lisa Aragon. She says Joe’s also makes “ankle-length petite sizes at a 25-inch inseam, which will hit right around the ankle bone for most.” Read on for more denim low-down, including the brand that custom-hems your jeans for free (Buck Mason), the curvy petites’ go-to brand (Universal Standard) and an Amazon impulse buy that has turned one petite wearer into a barrel-leg jeans enthusiast (Plnotme).
