How to Shrink a Shirt (Plus Jeans, Hoodies and Sweaters)

Learning how to shrink a shirt starts with the label, not the washing machine. The fiber decides almost everything: cotton shrinks readily and fairly predictably, polyester barely moves, and wool can shrink so unevenly that it ruins the garment.

Get the fiber right and shrinking clothes on purpose comes down to heat, water and checking your progress. Get it wrong and you end up with a shirt that's shorter but no narrower, a hoodie covered in pills, or a sweater that would fit a toddler. Here's how to do it properly for shirts, jeans, hoodies and sweaters.

Check the Fiber Before You Try Anything

Shrinking works on fibers that absorb water and relax when they're heated. Cotton is the best candidate, so knowing how to shrink cotton covers most of what people want to resize. Its fibers swell in hot water and contract as they dry, and cotton fabric is often stretched during manufacturing, so heat lets it pull back. Untreated cotton can shrink roughly 3 to 5%, sometimes more in loose knits like jersey, and most of it happens in the first hot wash.

Linen shrinks a bit too. Rayon and viscose shrink easily but unpredictably, often twisting or losing shape along the way. Polyester and nylon hardly change at all, so a 100% polyester shirt is mostly a lost cause. Blends land in between. A 60/40 cotton and polyester tee will shrink less than pure cotton, roughly in proportion to how much cotton it contains.

Then look for words like "preshrunk" or "garment dyed." Those shirts have already been through their big shrink at the factory, so a hot wash at home will only take off a little more. Our guide to fabrics that shrink ranks the common fibers by how much they move. If the composition tag is hard to read, scanning it with WearScore shows the exact fiber breakdown, so you know whether you're working with cotton or a polyester blend before you turn up the heat.

Wool sits in its own category. It doesn't shrink so much as felt, and that process is permanent and hard to control. More on that in the sweater section.

How to Shrink a Shirt in the Washer and Dryer

For a cotton or cotton heavy shirt, the washer and dryer method is the easiest and the most even. It works on tees, button downs and long sleeves.

1. Turn the shirt inside out to protect the color and any print.
2. Wash it alone or with similar colors on the hottest water setting your machine offers. Hot water can make new cotton bleed dye.
3. Move it straight to the dryer on high heat.
4. Check it every 10 to 15 minutes. Try it on or lay it against a shirt that fits.
5. Stop when it's close to the size you want, then let it finish drying flat.

Most of the shrinking happens near the end of the dryer cycle, as the last moisture is driven out, which is why checking matters. If the shirt isn't small enough after one round, repeat the whole process. Each cycle takes off less than the one before, so expect diminishing returns after two or three rounds.

Two things to expect. Cotton shirts shrink more in length than in width, so a shirt that's too long will respond better than one that's too wide. And high heat is hard on fabric. A few hot cycles won't destroy a good shirt, but making it a habit will fade the color and wear out the fibers faster.

The Boiling Water Method

When the washer can't get hot enough, boiling water can. This method suits 100% cotton shirts that are a full size too big. Bring a large pot of water to a boil, turn off the heat, and submerge the shirt with tongs or a wooden spoon. Let it soak for about 5 to 10 minutes, then lift it out, let it cool, wring out the water and put it in the dryer on high.

Boiling water shrinks more aggressively than a washing machine, which is both the point and the risk. It can bleed dye heavily, so never do two colors together. It can crack screen printed graphics and loosen some trims. It also shrinks unevenly if the shirt isn't fully submerged. Keep the pot off the burner while the shirt is in it, and handle everything carefully, because wet cotton holds a lot of heat.

Don't use this method on rayon, wool, spandex blends or anything with leather or plastic details. It's a cotton only trick.

Targeted Shrinking With a Spray Bottle, Iron or Hair Dryer

Sometimes only part of a shirt is the problem: baggy sleeves, a long hem, cuffs that have stretched out. A full wash shrinks everything, so targeted heat is the better tool here.

Mist the area you want to shrink with a spray bottle until it's damp but not dripping. Then dry it with a hair dryer on its hottest setting, moving slowly across the fabric until the area is completely dry. For flat areas like hems and cuffs, an iron on the cotton setting works faster. Press rather than slide, and use steam if your iron has it.

Repeat as needed, checking as you go. This gives you more control but smaller results than a full hot wash, and like every heat method, it works on cotton and linen far better than on synthetics. It's also the safest thing to try before committing a whole shirt to the dryer.

How to Shrink Jeans

How to shrink jeans depends on how the denim was finished. Raw denim that is unsanforized, often sold as "shrink to fit," has never been preshrunk, so it shrinks considerably in its first soak. That's by design. A long soak in hot water followed by drying is how these jeans are meant to be broken in, and some owners soak them while wearing them so they mold to their body.

Most jeans, though, are sanforized, meaning the fabric was mechanically preshrunk at the mill so it barely moves afterward, typically around 1% or less. A hot wash and high heat dry will tighten sanforized jeans a little, mostly in length, but you won't get a full size out of them.

Stretch denim is the trickiest. Those jeans contain spandex, and heat damages spandex. A hot dryer can make stretch jeans feel snug for a few hours, but they stretch right back with wear, and repeated high heat leaves them saggy, sometimes with tiny elastic threads poking through the fabric. To tighten the waist on stretch jeans, use the spray bottle and hair dryer method on that area only, and sparingly. For a permanent change, a tailor is the better option. Our guide to the best fabric for jeans explains how to spot each type before you buy.

How to Shrink a Hoodie

Hoodies are almost always fleece, and the type of fleece matters. Cotton fleece, or a cotton heavy blend like 80% cotton and 20% polyester, shrinks well with the washer and dryer method above. Wash hot, dry high, check often. The ribbed cuffs and waistband usually shrink a little less than the body, which is normally fine.

Polyester fleece won't shrink in any meaningful way. Hot cycles mostly mat the brushed interior, increase pilling and leave the outside looking worn. If your hoodie is mostly polyester, buying a smaller size is a better plan than fighting it.

Hoodies carry a few extra risks. Large front prints can crack under repeated high heat, and drawstrings can shrink at a different rate from the hood. Turn the hoodie inside out, and pull it from the dryer while it's slightly damp to limit the stress on prints and ribbing.

How to Shrink a Sweater

Sweaters need the most caution, because the right method depends completely on fiber. Cotton sweaters shrink much like cotton shirts. A hot wash and a medium dryer cycle, checked often, can take them down a bit. Acrylic sweaters won't shrink, and high heat can permanently relax acrylic, leaving it limp and stretched instead of smaller.

Wool is the risky one. Hot water plus agitation makes the tiny scales on wool fibers lock together, which shrinks the garment and thickens the knit. This is felting, and it's irreversible. It's also hard to stop at the right point, and it can shrink the body and the sleeves unevenly. If you still want to try, wash the sweater in warm water with plenty of movement for just a few minutes, check it, and repeat in short bursts. Lay it flat to dry and shape it by hand. Never use this on cashmere or on a sweater you'd hate to lose.

Superwash wool, treated to resist felting, will respond much less. Our guide to wool fabric covers why different wools behave so differently in water.

The Right Fit Starts at the Label

Shrinking clothes on purpose is doable, but it's a blunt tool. It works best on cotton, it mostly takes off length, and every round of high heat costs the fabric a little lifespan. Polyester and spandex blends barely respond, and wool responds too much.

The easier path is buying the right size in a fiber that behaves the way you expect. Scan the label with WearScore and you see the fiber mix, the grade, the care complexity and the dryer safety rating before you pay. If a shirt is 100% polyester, you'll know shrinking isn't an option. If it's untreated cotton, you'll know to allow for a little shrinkage after the first wash, and you can size accordingly.