How to size ski goggles, for adults, small faces and children

Why there is no goggle size chart

Helmets publish head circumference in centimeters. Boots publish mondopoint. Goggles publish words: small, medium, large, junior, youth, low bridge, OTG. Those words are not standardized between brands and frequently not standardized within one brand across model years. This page exists because the chart you were looking for does not exist, and the physical checks below are what replaces it.

Look at the published specifications in this ledger and the pattern is obvious. Smith publishes the Squad in a single frame size, and states plainly that smaller and larger faces need a different model. Smith publishes the Rascal as fitting small to medium faces. Bolle publishes the Nevada as junior. OutdoorMaster publishes the Falcon as kids. Not one of those is a measurement.

The three checks

One: the foam seal, all the way round

Hold the goggle to your face without the strap and press gently. The face foam should contact continuously from the bridge of the nose, up around the brow, down the temples and back under the cheekbone. Then let go. A goggle that stays put for a second or two on suction alone has a real seal.

The gap that matters most is at the bridge of the nose, because that is where warm breath gets in and where fogging starts. The anti-fog page is mostly a page about preventing exactly this gap. The second most common gap is at the outer temples on a narrow face, which lets wind in and makes eyes water.

Two: the helmet brow

Put your helmet on, dialed to the setting you actually ski at, and then the goggles. The top of the goggle frame should tuck under the helmet brow with no strip of exposed forehead between them, and the helmet should not be pushed up or tilted back by the frame. If the helmet lifts, the frame is too tall for that shell.

This is a two-product problem and it is worth solving in the right order: buy the helmet first, because a helmet has a certification and a size range and a goggle has neither. The dedicated helmet and goggle fit page goes through the failure modes, and how the helmet dial changes the gap is a detail most people discover after buying.

Three: the nose and the breath

With the goggle on and the strap at a normal tension, you should be able to breathe out through your nose without feeling the air pushed up behind the lens. If the nose piece sits too low, or if you have pulled a neck gaiter up under the frame, the goggle becomes a chimney for warm wet air and it will fog within minutes of the first lift.

What the frame size words usually mean

The one label that is a genuine engineering difference rather than a size is OTG. Bolle publishes the Y7 as a purpose-built over-the-glasses frame rather than a normal goggle sold as OTG, and that distinction is the whole thing: the goggles-for-glasses page compares the field, including which ones are only labeled OTG.

Sizing a child, without them present

Buying a child a small adult goggle is the single most common mistake in this category. An adult frame on a child leaves a gap under the cheekbones, sits on the bridge of a small nose, and pushes the helmet up at the back. It is not a matter of it looking large; it does not seal.

Use a junior or youth frame, and if the child wears glasses use a junior OTG frame, which Bolle publishes for the Nevada Junior and Smith publishes for the Daredevil. The good news for a family budget is that the youth OTG frames tend to be published at the same price as the non-OTG version, so the glasses question is usually free. The kids goggle roundup ranks the field on published UV protection and anti-fog treatment.

• Age roughly 3 to 6. A kids frame. Check that it clears the helmet brow, because small helmets have proportionally deep brows.
• Age roughly 7 to 12. A junior or youth frame. This is where the small-to-medium adult frames start to become plausible on a bigger child.
• Teenagers. Usually a standard adult frame, or a small-fit one on a narrow face.

Children grow through goggle frames more slowly than through boots or helmets, because the face widens later than the head and the feet. The growing-room page covers where handing gear down works, and goggles are one of the places it genuinely does, provided the foam is intact and the inner lens has never been wiped.

The strap is part of the fit

Two details people miss. The strap should run around the widest part of the helmet, roughly level with the goggle frame, not ride up toward the crown. And the strap should be tensioned just enough to hold the goggle against your face without compressing the foam flat, because compressed foam stops venting and a goggle that cannot vent will fog.

Most snow helmets have a clip or a strap retainer at the back for exactly this, and using it is what stops a goggle disappearing down the run after a fall. If you ski without a helmet, note that goggle straps are designed with helmet circumference in mind and will need most of their adjustment range.

Buying without trying, which is what most people do

You can get a long way from published information alone. Check three things before ordering: whether the maker publishes a frame size at all, whether it publishes an OTG version if you need one, and whether it publishes the lens count, because a single-lens goggle limits you to one set of conditions. The VLT guide covers which single lens to choose if you are only owning one, and the night skiing page covers the specific case where one lens is not enough.

Then run the three checks the moment it arrives, indoors, with your helmet on, while the return window is open. A goggle that gaps at the temples in your living room will gap at the temples on a chairlift, and that is a return rather than something to get used to.