Dataset List
Detailed information about the datasets in case you need it for whatever reason.
Words of importance:
- Avg.: Average.
- SD: Standard Deviation.
- n: Number of measurements for each dataset or average.
- N/A: Not Applicable.
- N/D: No Data.
- Volumetric Estimates: Rough estimates on what the average volume could be. See this page for more details.
- Stretched Length: See this page.
- Meta-dataset: A dataset that combines data from other studies/datasets.
- Self-reported: Measurements were submitted individually by each person rather than being measured by a professional.
- Bone-pressed (BP): Length measurements for this dataset were done pressed against the pubic bone.
- Non bone-pressed (NBP): Length measurements for this dataset were done against the skin, not compressing any of the fat pad.
- Base-shaft/Mid-shaft girth: Girth measurements were done either at the base or near the middle, respectively.
- calcSD Global Average (v4)
- Data:
- Author: /u/FrigidShadow
- Source: https://calcsd.netlify.com/study4
- Countries: Global
- Measurements: Researcher measured, BP and NBP length (separately), Mixed base and mid-shaft girth, Meta-dataset
- Notes:
- This is the main dataset used by calcSD that combines many different studies. All information about it is available here.
- Regional Subsets (Western and Eastern)
- Data:
- Notes:
- Only studies from Eastern/Southern Asia demonstrate an appreciable difference compared to other regions of the world. Alternative subdivisions do not show appreciable difference. Grouping averages into narrower regions would likely only show differences due to random chance rather than differences between populations.
- Pereira 2004
- Data:
- Averages:
- Stretched Length: 15.14cm (SD 2.12) - 5.96" (SD 0.83)
- Flaccid Length: 9.86cm (SD 1.84) - 3.88" (SD 0.72)
- Flaccid Girth: 9.39cm (SD 1.05) - 3.70" (SD 0.41)
- Notes:
- This study has a nearly random sample from a military inspection of Portuguese males (aged 18-25 yrs). Their military was technically mandatory until 2004, but during 2000-2004 (when this study likely gathered its sample), Portugal transitioned from mandatory service for all men to a voluntary military, such that this study likely isn't free from volunteer bias.
- There is also self-reported erect length data provided, however it was unmeasured and instead estimated from memory of a subset of individuals, so it's not very useful.
- Ponchietti et al. 2001
- Data:
- Authors: Roberto Ponchietti, Nicola Mondaini, Massimiliano Bonafè, Filippo Di Loro, Stefano Biscioni, Lorenzo Masieri
- Source: https://doi.org/10.1159/000052434
- Country: Italy
- Measurements: Researcher measured, NBP length, Mid-shaft girth
- n: 3300
- Averages:
- Stretched Length: 12.50cm (SD 2.50) - 4.92" (SD 0.98)
- Flaccid Length: 9.00cm (SD 2.00) - 3.54" (SD 0.79)
- Flaccid Girth: 10.00cm (SD 0.75) - 3.94" (SD 0.30)
- Notes:
- This study has a truly random sample from a compulsory inspection of all Italian males (aged 17-19 yrs). It is one of the only studies not affected by volunteer bias. It also heavily rounded all its results to the nearest half cm.
- Due to finding minor left skew, the normal approximation is slightly inconsistent with the percentiles given in the study (though the slight left skew might be explained by the presence of not yet fully developed younger males or the distribution of body fat % having a right skew).
- LifeStyles Condoms (2001)
- Data:
- Averages:
- Erect Length: 14.93cm (SD 2.10) - 5.88" (SD 0.83)
- Erect Girth: 12.63cm (SD 1.29) - 4.97" (SD 0.51)
- Notes:
- There are many sources of fake data online for this study, in reality almost nothing more than what is found in the above source link has been provided by its authors. The only other reliable source of information seems to be this online article, which was published 3 weeks after the study finished collecting data and includes somewhat reliable information from interviews of the researchers.
- Di Mauro et al. 2021
- Data:
- Authors: Marina Di Mauro, Camilla Tonioni, Andrea Cocci, Luis A. Kluth, Giorgio Ivan Russo, Juan Gomez Rivas, Giovanni Cacciamani, Gianmartin Cito, Girolamo Morelli, Gaia Polloni, Fabrizio di Maida, Daniel Giunti
- Source: https://doi.org/10.1111/and.14053
- Country: Italy
- Measurements: Self-reported, BP length, Shaft girth
- n: 4685
- Averages:
- Erect Length: 16.78cm (SD 2.55) - 6.61" (SD 1.00)
- Erect Girth: 12.03cm (SD 3.82) - 4.74" (SD 1.50)
- Flaccid Length: 9.47cm (SD 2.69) - 3.73" (SD 1.06)
- Flaccid Girth: 9.59cm (SD 3.08) - 3.78" (SD 1.21)
- Notes:
- The males sampled were gathered from andrological consultations, and included an appreciable proportion of likely undeveloped/underaged males, so it isn't the most ideal sample, but at least it is one of very few self-reported studies where the researchers tried to standardize measuring methodology. It is quite remarkable how this study is almost identical in design to any of the other clinical studies with only the difference of having self-measurement rather than researcher measurement, and yet the result is such an extreme difference in SDs. The high SDs are easily explained as the addition of inter-measurer variation, rather than a reflection of the actual variability of penis size in a population. In other words, they probably didn't do a good job of ensuring that people measured correctly. The many unreasonable consequences from the results of self reported studies like this depict a cautionary tale against relying on them for actual information. For example it has around 20% of guys too small and 10% of guys too big for the smallest and largest condoms in the world... probably mostly because of some ill-advised individuals measuring width, though the study's unreliability from other biases reaches all the measures. Self-reported studies are a reflection of what people claim rather than what people have.
- Kinsey Data Publication: Gebhard & Johnson 1979
- Data:
- Averages:
- Erect Length: 15.65cm (SD 1.88) - 6.16" (SD 0.74)
- Erect Girth: 12.33cm (SD 1.61) - 4.86" (SD 0.64)
- Flaccid Length: 9.84cm (SD 1.81) - 3.87" (SD 0.71)
- Flaccid Girth: 9.63cm (SD 1.42) - 3.79" (SD 0.56)
- Notes:
- Participants were sent home with cards, which according to the Kinsey Institute and Gebhard were to be used to mark their measurements before mailing the cards back. The researchers then converted these measures to 1/4 inch increments. One could interpret that they were to directly measure and mark their endpoints on the cards rather than use numbers, however the spikes of whole and half inches in the data demonstrate that the participants measured themselves with their own measuring devices and then wrote their numerical measurements on the cards.
- "Respondents were given cards to fill out and return in preaddressed stamped envelopes, and were instructed to measure on the top surface from belly to tip of penis ... and were instructed to measure at the point of maximum circumference"
- Data Corrected: An important consequence of self-reporting girth often occurs where a distinct bump is observed near the 1-2 inch range, this is due to males who provide width measurements instead of circumference. This bump is clearly visible in this study, so to correct the issue I have reduced the data to appropriate levels for erect and flaccid girths at or below 2 inches. This correction reduces the girth SDs away from the unusually high values that Kinsey Data publications usually give, and it is the main benefit of using this publication which provided raw data.
- There are other subsets from different publications of the Kinsey Data, though they usually get similar results to each other, most notably the data finds appreciably higher averages among Black males and among homosexual males, though much of this observed difference is likely due to differences in exaggeration/selection biases between sample groups rather than genuine population differences. This publication does include a small portion of underage males, though comparisons to other subsets with only adults show no detectable difference, especially compared to the very obvious differences between Black/White and heterosexual/homosexual subgroups.
- Due to the highly personal and sexual nature of these face-to-face interviews, there were severe issues with selection bias favoring nonrepresentative sexually outgoing individuals, additionally the penis size measurement questions had a further heavy non-response bias of half the participants not mailing back their measurements. Those sampling issues in combination with the potential for exaggeration, leave every expectation that this study is an overestimate of the average penis size. However, it does serve as a reasonable comparison for what to expect when people self-report their sizes.
- Herbenick et al. 2014
- Data:
- Authors: Debby Herbenick, Michael Reece, Vanessa Schick, Stephanie A. Sanders
- Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23841855
- Country: United States
- Measurements: Self-reported, Underside length, Mid-shaft girth
- n: 1661
- Averages:
- Erect Length: 14.15cm (SD 2.66) - 5.57" (SD 1.05)
- Erect Girth: 12.31cm (SD 2.09) - 4.85" (SD 0.82)
- Notes:
- Data Corrected: An important consequence of self-reporting girth often occurs where a distinct bump is observed near the 1-2 inch range, this is due to males who provide width measurements instead of circumference. This bump is clearly visible in this study, so to correct the issue I have reduced the data to appropriate levels for erect girths at or below 6 cms, this correction slightly increases the girth mean and slightly decreases the girth SD, though the overall difference is very small.
- The length and girth distributions Herbenick finds are statistically slightly different from the normal distribution, though slight deviations like this are to be expected with self-reported data where there are many confounding biases that would disrupt the population distribution, I've already pointed out and corrected one such issue. However, it is my expectation that the normal approximation we use is more accurate than relying on the raw data percentiles Herbenick provides.
- Veale+
- Data:
- Author: /u/FrigidShadow
- Source: https://calcsd.netlify.com/veale
- Countries: Turkey, Italy, Egypt, Iran, Bulgaria, France, U.K. (Scotland), Nigeria, India, Jordan, Tanzania, United States, Korea, Germany, Canada, Greece
- Measurements: Researcher measured, BP and NBP length (separately), Mixed base and mid-shaft girth, Meta-dataset
- Studies: Ponchietti et al. 2001, Söylemez et al. 2011, Shalaby et al. 2014, Mehraban et al. 2006, Aslan et al. 2011, Kamel et al. 2009, Tomova et al. 2010, Bondil et al. 1992, Khan et al. 2012, Ajmani et al. 1985, Promodu et al. 2007, Awwad et al. 2004, Chrouser et al. 2013, Sengezer et al. 2002, Choi et al. 2011, Savoie et al. 2003, Schneider et al. 2001, Wessells et al. 1996, Siminoski et al. 1993, Spyropoulos et al. 2005
- n: BP Erect Length: 191 - NBP Erect Length: 321 - Erect Girth: 121 - Flaccid Girth: 9186 - BP Flaccid Length: 4316 - NBP Flaccid Length: 6935 - BP Stretched Length: 7247 - NBP Stretched Length: 6691
- Averages:
- BP Erect Length: 15.06cm (SD 2.30) - 5.93" (SD 0.91)
- NBP Erect Length: 12.82cm (SD 2.46) - 5.05" (SD 0.97)
- Erect Girth: 11.96cm (SD 1.20) - 4.71" (SD 0.47)
- Flaccid Girth: 9.23cm (SD 0.99) - 3.63" (SD 0.39)
- BP Flaccid Length: 9.36cm (SD 1.49) - 3.69" (SD 0.59)
- NBP Flaccid Length: 8.77cm (SD 1.71) - 3.45" (SD 0.67)
- BP Stretched Length: 13.82cm (SD 1.79) - 5.44" (SD 0.70)
- NBP Stretched Length: 11.99cm (SD 2.04) - 4.72" (SD 0.80)
- Notes:
- This dataset has unreliably low sample sizes for erect measurements. Veale+ is a fully corrected version of the original Veale study made using exactly the same studies. All information about it is available here.
- Veale et al. 2015
- Data:
- Authors: David Veale, Sarah Miles, Sally Bramley, Gordon Muir, John Hodsoll
- Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25487360
- Countries: Turkey, Italy, Egypt, Iran, Bulgaria, France, U.K. (Scotland), Nigeria, India, Jordan, Tanzania, United States, Korea, Germany, Canada, Greece
- Measurements: Researcher measured, Mixed BP and NBP length, Mixed base and mid-shaft girth, Meta-dataset
- Studies: Ponchietti et al. 2001, Söylemez et al. 2011, Shalaby et al. 2014, Mehraban et al. 2006, Aslan et al. 2011, Kamel et al. 2009, Tomova et al. 2010, Bondil et al. 1992, Khan et al. 2012, Ajmani et al. 1985, Promodu et al. 2007, Awwad et al. 2004, Chrouser et al. 2013, Sengezer et al. 2002, Choi et al. 2011, Savoie et al. 2003, Schneider et al. 2001, Wessells et al. 1996, Siminoski et al. 1993, Spyropoulos et al. 2005
- n: (Error corrected) Erect Length: 432 - Erect Girth: 121 - Flaccid Girth: 9186 - Flaccid Length: 10642 - Stretched Length: 13938
- Averages:
- Erect Length: 13.12cm (SD 1.66) - 5.16" (SD 0.65)
- Erect Girth: 11.66cm (SD 1.10) - 4.59" (SD 0.43)
- Flaccid Girth: 9.31cm (SD 0.90) - 3.67" (SD 0.35)
- Flaccid Length: 9.16cm (SD 1.57) - 3.61" (SD 0.62)
- Stretched Length: 13.24cm (SD 1.89) - 5.21" (SD 0.75)
- Notes:
- This is not a recommended dataset due to its many errors and mixing bone-pressed and non bone-pressed measurements.
- /r/BDP's Average (2019)
- Data:
- Author: /u/CarnivalNightZone
- Source: https://calcsd.neocities.org/bdp2019/results.html
- Countries: Global
- Measurements: Self-reported, Unspecified measuring methodology
- n: Erect Length: 1383 - Erect Girth: 1353 - Flaccid Length: 1232 - Flaccid Girth: 1117
- Averages:
- Erect Length: 18.48cm (SD 1.99) - 7.28" (SD 0.78)
- Erect Girth: 14.23cm (SD 1.57) - 5.60" (SD 0.62)
- Flaccid Length: 10.60cm (SD 2.58) - 4.17" (SD 1.02)
- Flaccid Girth: 9.49cm (SD 2.45) - 3.74" (SD 0.96)
- Notes:
- This is a survey that happened on a subreddit. This is mostly here "because why not?" and shouldn't be used as a real study.