All the Presidents in Height Order
When we think of U.S. Presidents through history, we don’t tend to picture their physical frame so much as recall a collection of historical facts and anecdotes. If you imagine George Washington, for example, is a mental image of his presence in a room the first thing that comes to mind? Or do you recall a story about a cherry tree, or crossing the Delaware? With a few exceptions here and there, the physicality of Presidents has been largely obscured by history. Can you name the tallest president? The shortest? What about the second-tallest or second-shortest? A full list of the height of each President follows, spanning a foot difference from 5 feet, 4 inches tall to 6 feet, 4 inches tall.
Over 6 Feet Tall
The tallest President in U.S. history was Abraham Lincoln, who stood at 6 feet, 4 inches — and that’s without his signature stovepipe hat. It’s a height that still sounds fairly tall today, but it was extraordinarily tall for the time; the average height for an American male during Lincoln’s presidency was 5 feet, 7 inches, making him 9 inches taller than average. Lincoln’s equivalent height today would be 6 feet, 7 inches — a half-inch taller than the average NBA player.
Given his distinct physical presence, it perhaps comes as no surprise that Lincoln’s appearance was frequently commented upon in his day. The New York Herald once wrote, “Lincoln is the leanest, lankiest, most ungainly mass of legs, arms, and hatchet-face ever strung upon a single frame.” Another reporter wrote of his “shambling gait” in London’s The Times, and described him as “a tall, lank, lean man, considerably over six feet in height, with stooping shoulders, long pendulous arms, terminating in hands of extraordinary dimensions, which, however, were far exceeded in proportion by his feet.” Here are the 18 other Presidents who stood over 6 feet, if not quite as noticeably as Uncle Abe.
- Abraham Lincoln: 6 feet, 4 inches (193 cm)
- Lyndon B. Johnson: 6 feet, 3.5 inches (192 cm)
- Donald J. Trump: 6 feet, 3 inches (191 cm)
- Thomas Jefferson: 6 feet, 2.5 inches (189 cm)
- Chester A. Arthur: 6 ft, 2 inches (188 cm)
- Bill Clinton: 6 feet, 2 inches (188 cm)
- George H. W. Bush: 6 feet, 2 inches (188 cm)
- Franklin D. Roosevelt: 6 feet, 2 inches (188 cm)
- George Washington: 6 feet, 2 inches (188 cm)
- Andrew Jackson: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
- John F. Kennedy: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
- Barack Obama: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
- Ronald Reagan: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
- James Buchanan: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
- Gerald R. Ford: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
- James A. Garfield: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
- Warren G. Harding: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
- James Monroe: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
- John Tyler: 6 feet, 1 inch (185 cm)
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Over 5 Feet, 10 Inches Tall
The average height of all 46 U.S. Presidents is 5 feet, 11 inches, and it has been decades since the United States elected a President below that height (in part, notably, because all U.S. Presidents have been male). Jimmy Carter was the last one, at 5 feet, 9.5 inches — still roughly an inch taller than the average American male at the time. According to the data, the United States almost never elects a President who is shorter than the average U.S. citizen of the time. The last time Americans voted in a shorter-than-average President was when Benjamin Harrison emerged victorious in the election of 1888, though at only 1.5 centimeters below the average of the time, he wouldn’t have been noticeably shorter. Based on this fact, it does seem that Americans prefer their Presidents to be somewhat tall — though, considering the lack of mention in exit polls over the years, that may be a subconscious preference rather than an actual requirement. Here are the Presidents who fell right around average height for a commander in chief, between 5 feet, 10 inches and 5 feet, 11 inches tall.
- Joe Biden: 5 feet, 11.5 inches (182 cm)
- George W. Bush: 5 feet, 11.5 inches (182 cm)
- Herbert Hoover: 5 feet, 11.5 inches (182 cm)
- Richard M. Nixon: 5 feet, 11.5 inches (182 cm)
- William H. Taft: 5 feet, 11.5 inches (182 cm)
- Grover Cleveland: 5 feet, 11 inches (180 cm)
- Woodrow Wilson: 5 feet, 11 inches (180 cm)
- Dwight D. Eisenhower: 5 feet, 10.5 inches (179 cm)
- Calvin Coolidge: 5 feet, 10 inches (178 cm)
- Andrew Johnson: 5 feet, 10 inches (178 cm)
- Franklin Pierce: 5 feet, 10 inches (178 cm)
- Theodore Roosevelt: 5 feet, 10 inches (178 cm)
Under 5 Feet, 10 Inches Tall
On the other end of the height spectrum, the shortest U.S. President was James Madison, who at 5 feet, 4 inches holds that record by 2 inches — the next-shortest Presidents were Martin Van Buren and Benjamin Harrison, both at 5 feet, 6 inches. The average height in Madison’s time was actually slightly taller than in Lincoln’s time; 172 centimeters to 170 centimeters, or just a bit shy of 5 feet, 8 inches. Despite Madison being the only President on record who was shorter than his First Lady (Dolley Madison was around 5 feet, 7 inches tall), his relatively diminutive physical stature didn’t cause nearly the same level of commentary as Lincoln’s lanky height (or if it did, that commentary is lost to history). To conclude our list, here are the 14 Presidents who stood under 5 feet, 10 inches tall.
- Jimmy Carter: 5 feet, 9.5 inches (177 cm)
- Millard Fillmore: 5 feet, 9 inches (175 cm)
- Harry S. Truman: 5 feet, 9 inches (175 cm)
- Rutherford B. Hayes: 5 feet, 8.5 inches (174 cm)
- Ulysses S. Grant: 5 feet, 8 inches (173 cm)
- William Henry Harrison: 5 feet, 8 inches (173 cm)
- James K. Polk: 5 feet, 8 inches (173 cm)
- Zachary Taylor: 5 feet, 8 inches (173 cm)
- John Quincy Adams: 5 feet, 7.5 inches (171 cm)
- John Adams: 5 feet, 7 inches (170 cm)
- William McKinley: 5 feet, 7 inches (170 cm)
- Benjamin Harrison: 5 feet, 6 inches (168 cm)
- Martin Van Buren: 5 feet, 6 inches (168 cm)
- James Madison: 5 feet, 4 inches (163 cm)
