What are the typical distributions (percentiles) for erect penis length and girth in large measured datasets?

1. Typical central values seen across large, clinician‑measured datasets

A widely cited systematic review that used clinician measurements reported mean erect length ≈13.12 cm and mean erect circumference ≈11.66 cm, measured from pubic bone to the glans and at base/mid‑shaft respectively ^{[1] [2]}. Other large syntheses and nomogram efforts that excluded self‑reports produced similar central estimates: pooled means for erect length cluster in the low‑teens of centimetres (≈13–14 cm) in clinician‑measured datasets ^{[3] [6]}.

2. What percentiles look like in published models and headlines

An accessible presentation of the Veale et al. pooled data models shows that an erect length of about 10 cm falls near the 5th percentile and about 16 cm is roughly the 95th percentile — that is, only about five in 100 men measured by clinicians have an erect length above ~16 cm (or below ~10 cm) in those pooled samples ^[2]. Nomogram construction work based on thousands of measured men supports a roughly bell‑shaped distribution around the reported means, so median values sit close to the pooled means reported above ^[3].

3. Typical spread and how to interpret SDs into percentiles

Individual measured studies report standard deviations in the ballpark of 2.5–2.7 cm for erect length (for example, an Italian clinical sample reported mean erect length 16.78 cm, SD 2.55; a large U.S. self‑measured sample reported mean 14.15 cm, SD 2.66) — illustrating that SDs of ~2.5 cm are common in datasets and produce the percentile spread noted above ^{[7] [8]}. Using an SD of ~2.5 cm around a mean of ~13 cm produces 5th and 95th percentiles that align with the ~10 cm and ~16 cm markers reported in pooled analyses, but exact cutoffs shift by sample and method ^{[3] [2]}.

4. Girth percentiles and available figures

Clinician‑measured pooled girth averages center near 11.66 cm (≈4.6 in) for erect circumference ^{[1] [2]}. Large individual studies show mean erect circumferences in the 12 cm range with SDs around 2.2–3.8 cm depending on the cohort ^{[8] [7]}, implying a 5th percentile for girth commonly falls around roughly 9–10 cm and the 95th around 14–15 cm in many measured samples — but explicit percentile tables for girth are less uniformly reported in the literature than those for length ^{[8] [7]}.

5. Why reported percentiles vary: measurement, selection and geography

Differences between studies are driven by whether men self‑measured or were measured by clinicians (self‑reports inflate means), how the penis was measured (bone‑to‑tip vs skin‑to‑tip, base vs midshaft girth), and sample composition (clinical populations, sexual orientation, geography and motivation) — all of which create heterogeneity in pooled meta‑analyses ^{[1] [4] [9]}. Interobserver variability and the imperfect correlation between stretched and erect length further complicate converting one metric into percentile ranks ^[5].

6. Practical takeaway and limits of the literature

For practical counseling and clinical nomograms, the best current clinician‑measured syntheses put median erect length ≈13 cm and girth ≈11.7 cm, with most men within ±~2.5 cm of those means and extreme percentiles (5th/95th) near ~10 cm and ~16 cm for length ^{[1] [3] [2]}. However, geographic variation, rising means reported over time in some meta‑analyses, and methodological inconsistency mean any percentile estimate should be tied explicitly to the measurement method and sample used; sources differ and some large single‑country studies report higher means ^{[9] [7]}.