My predicted height doesn’t seem likely

Last updated on November 7, 2024

Question:

I am currently 5’7” and I am 15 years old my dad is 5’11” and my mom is 6’0” and my predicted height says that I will be 6’0’.

But the Tanner Stage Calculator says I’m at 4.1, and it says you only grow 1-3 inches during this stage. So, is the calculator inaccurate, and what do you think my predicted height should be?

Sorry if you get a lot of these height questions.

Answer:

The height calculators guess at your stage of development or simply ignore it. This can throw them off if you are an early or late bloomer. But I don’t think this is what is off in your case.

Generally, a boy in a family grows to at least the average of his parents’ heights. Thus, I would expect you to at least reach 5’11.5″. There can be circumstances that might cause a boy not to reach his potential height, such as a severe disease or lack of nutrition, but these are rare cases. Being at stage 4.1 would be common for a 15-year-old boy, but I would have expected you to be at least 5’9″ at this point.

More likely is that you got too high of an estimate on the Tanner Stage Calculator. But I don’t have enough information to figure out why this happened. I would need to know your growth over the last 5 years or so, and your answers to the questions on the calculator. Even then, I won’t be able to double-check your answers since I have no idea what you look like but I might be able to narrow down where the problem lies.

Question:

I did it different times on the Tanner Stage Calculator and got between 3.5 and 4.0.

Answer:

3.5 would mean that you are still in the rapid growth phase and likely to reach the projected height.