The questions we are asked most, answered properly. Each one names the band, the cup, the wire or the rise that causes it. A cause is the only thing you can act on.
Part 1 of 3
Two measurements, and what to do with them.
A good shop fitter is free, and she can do the one thing no tool can: put a bra on you and look at it. She can also only fit you in what is on the floor behind her, and she is paid to sell it.
So use both. Start with the Size check here, which has no stock to protect, then take the styles it names into a shop and try them on.
At home, in two minutes, with a soft tape. Level and snug round your ribs directly under the bust, then level and loose across the fullest point.
The Size check draws where the tape goes for each one, so you can see it rather than read it. A shop will measure you too, but a measurement is where fitting starts, not where it ends.
Use a phone charger cable. Wrap it where the tape would go, pinch the spot with your thumb, then hold the length against a ruler.
Do not use a belt or anything that will not lie flat. A twisted line reads short, and a band that reads short is how you end up two sizes out.
No. The same body is a 32F on one chart, a 30G on another, and not cut at all by a third. Bands shift, cup letters double up above D in the UK and do not in Europe, and every brand drafts on its own block.
That is why we print your size in each brand's own notation. The Brand map in the Fit Report gives you the number to ask for, shop by shop.
It also says plainly which brands do not cut you at all, so you stop shopping there.
A sister size holds the same cup volume on a different band. Go down a band and up a cup letter, and the cup holds the same amount.
It works the other way too: up a band, down a letter.
Use one when your true size is not cut in the style you want. Use the smaller band if you can fasten it on the loosest hook, because the band is what supports you.
Part 2 of 3
Every one of these has a mechanical cause, and the cause is not you.
In the cup, volume has nowhere to go, so it escapes. Over the top edge, out under your arm, or as a second crease across the middle, which is the quad boob.
In the wire, the shape is too narrow for the base of your breast, so it climbs onto tissue instead of resting on your ribs. That is what the poking is.
A band that is genuinely too small feels tight when you breathe all the way out. That is rare. Nine times in ten the band is too loose and the cup is too small at the same time.
Straps digging is not a strap problem. If the band is not anchoring, the straps carry the weight, and shoulders are not built to.
The band creeps up your back. The cup wrinkles or gaps at the top. The straps slip however short you make them.
And you can pull the band more than 5 cm (2 in) away from your spine.
The band riding up is the giveaway. The weight sits in front, the band has nothing to grip, so the front is pulled down and the back travels up to meet it.
Go down in the band and up a cup letter, which is a sister size, and fasten it on the loosest hook. A band you buy already on the tightest hook has nowhere left to go.
There is no style that wins. Comfort is the band doing about 80 per cent of the work, so your shoulders do almost none.
Three things have to be true. The centre front lies flat against your chest, the wires sit on ribcage the whole way round, and the band holds on its loosest hook.
Once that is right, the cup seams and the fabric decide whether you notice the bra at all. Before it is right, no fabric on earth will help.
Be careful with anything sold as comfortable that has a soft stretch band and no structure. It has not removed the work, it has moved it to your shoulders.
The rise is short for your hip-to-waist ratio. So the waistband settles on the widest part of you instead of above it, and folds where it has nothing to grip.
It is not a size problem, and going up a size usually makes it worse. Raise the rise and widen the band, and size on your hip if your hip is more than about 1.32 times your waist.
The line you can see is almost always an edge, not a size. A rolled waistband, a picot leg elastic and a gathered hem all sit proud of the fabric and print through.
Bonded or laser-cut edges, a single layer, and a leg line that crosses your thigh at its flattest point are what fix it. A tighter size prints harder, not less.
Band elastic is finished at roughly 180 wears. Worn once a week that is about 2 years, worn twice a week it is about 1.
Replace it when the loosest hook no longer holds you, not when it looks tired. A band you can only wear on the tightest hook is done, and no adjustment brings a band back.
Rotate 3 so none of them is worn on consecutive days, wash cool, and never tumble dry. Heat is what kills elastane, not washing.
Part 3 of 3
The awkward questions, answered before you have to ask them.
No. There is no upload field anywhere in this product, so there is nothing to think twice about. We cannot see you and we never ask to.
You give us numbers, what you wear now, and what it does. Your email is asked for once, at checkout, so we can send you the link to your Fit file.
No. We hold no stock, which is the whole point of us. Every other fit tool is owned by someone with a drawer to empty, so every other fit tool answers in its own sizes.
Because we sell nothing, we can say the things a shop cannot. That the answer is a brand we do not carry. That your band is 4 sizes out.
That the bra you paid a lot for is unfixable, and should go in the bin.
Sometimes, and you should know it. Some shops pay us a commission when a sale comes from a link in your report. Most of the brands we name pay us nothing.
So here is the rule we hold ourselves to. The Shortlist is ordered by fit first and free returns second.
A style that pays us never outranks one that fits you better and pays nothing. If two fit equally, free returns wins.
The $19 is what the company runs on. The commission is topping, and it is not allowed to touch the order.
Tell us and we do a Re-fit: a fresh verdict on your Fit file. 3 of those are free, and then a Re-fit is $9.
If it is still wrong, you get your money back once, with no proof, no photo, no receipt and nothing to return. A refunded email and card can never buy from us again, and that is the whole catch.
Yes. The Mother & Daughter Report is $29 and gives you two full reports, one each. Hers adds a first-bra section written for a girl rather than at her.
Her half uses clinical words only: breast, chest, underbust, outline visible through fabric. It says so in its first line, so nobody is caught out.
Your own answer takes 2 minutes
The Size check asks what you wear now and what it does. It shows you where to put the tape, then gives you your true size on the next screen. No photo, no account, no card.
Something not answered here. The Notes go further, and the inbox at the bottom of this page is read by a person.