Shopping Smart
Sizing Reviews Are The Only Reviews Worth Reading
Star ratings on clothing measure satisfaction with a purchase rather than the garment, but comments about fit carry information no product page provides.
Clothing reviews are dominated by short positive comments that say nothing useful. The exception is anything describing how a garment fit a body whose measurements are stated.
Ratings measure the transaction, not the garment
Most reviews are written shortly after delivery, before the item has been worn much or washed at all.
What they capture is whether the package arrived, whether it looked like the photographs, and whether the buyer was pleased in the moment.
Durability, shrinkage, pilling and color loss all appear months later, by which point almost nobody returns to update a review, so the rating never reflects them.
Selection skews the sample
People who received something they disliked frequently return it and move on rather than writing about it, while satisfied buyers are prompted by email to leave a rating.
Some of the most informative outcomes are therefore missing from the record entirely, and the average rating sits higher than the experience of all buyers would suggest.
This is why nearly every garment on a large site carries a similar high score, and why the score is close to useless for choosing between two items.
Fit comments contain real data
A review stating a person's height, usual size and the size they bought is providing measurements the product page did not.
Several such comments together establish whether a garment runs large or small, and where — a shirt can be generous in the body and tight in the shoulder, and only wearers report that.
These comments are also self-verifying to a degree, since a consistent pattern across many independent buyers is unlikely to be manufactured.
Photographs from buyers show the fabric
Customer images are lit badly and composed poorly, which is precisely what makes them useful. They show the garment under ordinary conditions rather than studio lighting.
Drape, opacity and actual color are all visible in a snapshot in a bedroom in a way they are not in professional photography.
A garment that looks substantially different in buyer images than in the listing has usually been photographed in ways that flatter the fabric.
Reading the low ratings first
The one- and two-star reviews are the shortest path to the failure modes, and they separate quickly into two kinds.
Complaints about shipping, packaging or a late delivery describe the seller and say nothing about the garment.
Complaints about seams opening, dye transferring, or a size arriving nothing like the chart describe the product, and a cluster of the same specific complaint is the strongest signal available on the page.
