In many countries, the scale is the same for men and women, however, that is not the case in the US.
Generally speaking, women’s feet are narrower than men. Even if the scales would match, there would still be a difference, which means that having the same scale or not would not make a huge difference.
As a rule of thumb, the difference is around 1.5, which means that a man’s size 8 would correspond to a women’s size 9.5.
In the US, women’s shoes range from 4 through 12 while men’s shoes range from 6 through 16.
Here is a table that shows the equivalence of each, usually, the smallest men’s size available is 5.5.
| Women’s Sizing | Men’s Sizing |
| 4 | – |
| 4.5 | – |
| 5 | – |
| 5.5 | – |
| 6 | – |
| 6.5 | – |
| 7 | 5.5 |
| 7.5 | 6 |
| 8 | 6.5 |
| 8.5 | 7 |
| 9 | 7.5 |
| 9.5 | 8 |
| 10 | 8.5 |
| 10.5 | 9 |
| 11 | 9.5 |
| 11.5 | 10 |
| 12 | 10.5 |
| – | 11 |
| – | 11.5 |
| – | 12 |
| – | 12.5 |
| – | 13 |
| – | 13.5 |
| – | 14 |
| – | 14.5 |
| – | 15 |
| – | 15.5 |
| – | 16 |
As a side note, not all shoes will be available in all sizes. If you have very small or very big feet, your options will naturally be more limited, which means either wearing shoes designed for kids or custom made ones.