DnD sizes explained

Every character and creature in Dungeons and Dragons is assigned one of six different DnD sizes – crucial categories that define how much space they take up on a map, which weapons they can carry, and more. This guide explains all the sizes 5e rules from across the core rulebooks, and it includes a handy DnD size chart you can reference.

We’ll go into exactly how the DnD size rules impact your character’s combat encounters, carrying capacity, and spells. We’ll also detail the ways to change a DnD creature’s size. Many of the rules around size depend on what sort of character you are, so you should also check out our complete guides to DnD classes and DnD races for the full context.

Dungeons and Dragons sizes explained:

DnD size chart

There are six DnD sizes in fifth edition: tiny, small, medium, large, huge, and gargantuan.

Is there a size bigger than Gargantuan?

In D&D 5e, Gargantuan is the maximum creature size category. 3.5e did have a Colossal category that went one step higher, but most editions haven’t bothered reproducing this.

Now we know what the different sizes mean in terms of which creatures are bigger than others, but how do they interact with the rules of the game? The rules for DnD creature sizes have multiple in-game effects:

DnD size rules

The complete DnD size rules are actually spread across multiple DnD books, with various chapters touching upon the subject. We’ve gathered the most important rules here:

Taking up space

The Player’s Handbook defines a creature’s space as “the area in feet it effectively controls in combat”.

Both Small and Medium creatures control a five-by-five-foot area on a battle map, but this doesn’t mean DnD Humans, Elves, and Goblins are all five-foot cubes. That’s just the space they can comfortably act in without needing to move.

Movement

If you are at least two sizes larger or smaller than an enemy, you can move through their space. You can always move through a friendly creature’s space, but you can’t end your turn there (even if they really like you).

One exception to this rule is the DnD Halfling, who can move through enemy spaces if they’re just one size smaller than that foe. However, an enemy’s space is always difficult terrain, and you can still trigger opportunity attacks by moving through a hostile creature’s zone.

The Dungeon Master’s Guide also features optional rules that modify your movement based on your size:

• Overrun – A creature can attempt a contested Athletics check to try and move through a hostile creature’s space. The character attempting the Overrun has advantage if it’s larger than the hostile creature, and they have disadvantage if they’re smaller.
• Tumble – A creature can make a contested Acrobatics check to move through a hostile creature’s space. Unlike Overrun, this check isn’t influenced by size.

Surrounding creatures

A creature’s size limits how many foes can surround it in combat, and vice versa.

The bigger the creature, the more squares surround it, and thus more enemies can get into melee range. At the same time, fewer large creatures can surround a smaller target.

For example, a Medium DnD Fighter will take up a single five-by-five square on a battlemap. Assuming all attackers are the same (Medium) size, eight of them can surround the Fighter, each taking up their own five-by-five square.

Meanwhile, a Huge creature occupies nine squares on a standard battlemap. This means far more Medium-sized enemies can get into melee range with the target.

Generally, this is a downside for bigger creatures. Everyone gets a single reaction per round to spend on opportunity attacks, and the only way to attack an army of creatures on your turn is with area-of-effect abilities. On the other hand, all those tiny enemies will have plenty of chance to take pot-shots, stacking the action economy of the fight massively in their favor.

Squeezing

In Dungeons and Dragons, all creatures can squeeze through gaps one size smaller than themselves. This means a Large creature can fit through a space big enough for a Medium creature, a Medium creature through a Small space, and so on.

While squeezing, a creature must spend an extra foot of movement for every foot they travel. They also have disadvantage on attack rolls and Dexterity saving throws, while attack rolls against them have advantage.

Strangely, Medium creatures should be able to squeeze through a Small space, but because both Small and Medium creatures occupy a five-by-five space, they would never need to. There’s also no suggestion for the size gap a Tiny creature might be able to squeeze through.

One creature that can ignore the size rules for squeezing is the Plasmoid, whose Amorphous feature lets them squeeze through spaces as small as one inch wide. However, they can’t wear or carry anything while using this ability.

Carrying capacity

For every size above Medium, a creature’s carrying capacity and the amount it can push, drag, or lift is doubled. Small creatures appear to have the same carrying capacity as Medium ones, but Tiny creatures have their carrying capabilities halved.

The standard carrying capacity (in lbs) equals a creature’s Strength score multiplied by 15. Similarly, a creature can easily push, drag, or lift something that weighs up to 30 times their Strength score.

For example, this means that a Large creature’s carrying capacity is its Strength score multiplied by 30. Meanwhile, a Tiny creature’s multiplier is just 7.5.

Grappling

In D&D, characters can’t be grappled by a monster that is two or more sizes smaller than them.

Similarly, a character can’t use the DnD grapple action on a creature that’s more than one size bigger. For example, a Small Halfling character can only grapple Medium foes, not Large ones.

Weapons and armor

In the DnD 2024 rules, Small or Tiny creatures can wield weapons with the ‘heavy’ property with no penalty, provided they have Strength 13 for melee weapons of Dexterity 13 for ranged weapons.

In the 2014 version of the DnD 5e rules, heavy DnD weapons imposed disadvantage on attack roles that small or tiny creatures made while attempting to use them, no matter how strong or dexterous they were.

A character’s choice of armor isn’t typically affected by their size; as long as they have the right DnD stats, they can don armor as heavy as they please. However, a DM can choose to apply “common sense rules” suggested by the Player’s Handbook. These rule that a Gnome would be too small to fit in the armor of a tall DnD Tiefling, for example.

Attacks

Generally, size rules don’t influence when and how you can attack.

There is one exception, in the 2014 version of the rules, though: the Hunter Ranger 5e subclass’s Hunter’ Prey feature. This allows them to attack a creature within five feet as a reaction – but only if that creature is Large size or bigger. The 2024 version of the ranger no longer has this ability.

Mounts

The Player’s Handbook says you can only mount “a willing creature that is at least one size larger than you”.

What if you want to ride an enormous (and unwilling) Purple Worm? Standard rulings would recommend a grapple check, but the size difference would likely make success impossible.

Alternatively, an optional rule in the Dungeon Master’s Guide suggests making an Athletics or Acrobatics check. If you can beat the larger creature’s Acrobatics roll, you can move into your target’s space.

After that, you move with your target and have advantage on attack rolls against it. The larger creature’s body is considered difficult terrain, and you might have to make further Athletics or Acrobatics checks as your mount tries to throw you off.

Initiative

Size doesn’t usually impact Initiative rolls, but an optional ‘Speed Factor’ Initiative rule in the Dungeon Master’s Guide changes this. ‘Speed Factor’ means rolling Initiative every round, then adding modifiers to your roll based on your size and the actions you take.

Here’s how size affects Initiative in these alternative rules:

Cover

The Player’s Handbook says you can use other creatures as cover. However, it’s up to DMs to decide the exact amount of cover one creature gives another.

The Dungeon Master’s Guide suggests that, to calculate cover, you should choose one corner of a monster’s battlemap square and draw a line from that point, reaching every corner of the target’s square. If two lines are blocked by the object or creature providing cover, the target has half cover. Three blocked lines equals three-quarter cover, and all lines being blocked means total cover.

Based on some experimenting, we’d say that, at most, a creature can gain half cover from another creature that is the same size. If the blocking creature is at least one size larger, they can provide anywhere from half cover to t0tal cover, depending on position.

Spellcasting

Your size doesn’t affect your ability to use magic. However, there are some 5e spells that refer to the D&D size rules.

For example:

• You can’t appear as a creature of a different size if you’re affected by Disguise Self or Alter Self.
• In the 2014 rules, Dimension Door and Thunder Step only let you teleport a friend along with you as long as they’re the same size or smaller. This no longer affects Dimension Door in the 2024 rules.
• Tree Stride specifies that you must be the same size or smaller than the trees you move through.
• In the 2014 rules, Bigby’s Hand gives you advantage on certain checks against Medium or smaller targets. The 2024 rules no longer give advantage based on size.

Speed

There is no direct correlation between size and speed in Dungeons and Dragons. However, in the 2014 edition, it was common for Small-sized creatures to move shorter distances per round.

For example, Halflings and Gnomes are both Small creatures, and they have a walking speed of 25 feet in the 2014 rules. Medium-sized creatures like a Human or a DnD Dragonborn tend to have a speed of 30 feet.

As we said, this isn’t a hard-and-fast rule, even in the older version of fifth edition. Some particularly agile species can have a speed of 35 feet, even if they’re classed as Medium-sized. And, in one unusual case, there’s a Medium creature with a speed of 25 feet – the DnD Dwarf.

While the link is inconsistent in the 2014 rules, it’s been erased entirely in the newer Player’s Handbook. Small character species now have a universal speed of 30 feet, just like their Medium counterparts. Some character options still give higher speeds, however, regardless of size.

Height and weight

While D&D lists average heights and weights for most species, these have no direct link to the rules for size. However, if you want to figure out the averages for a DnD size category, you can use information from previous editions to work this out.

One popular chart for defining height and weight can be found in the 3.5e Dungeon Master’s Guide. Here’s the information most useful to fifth edition players:

While fifth edition did away with specific heights and weights for DnD sizes, these categories mostly still apply. For example, check out the Random Height and Weight table from the 2014 Player’s Handbook:

Similarly, the 2024 Player’s Handbook (while it no longer lists average weights) says that the Goliath is between 7 and 8 feet tall, the usual maximum for a Medium creature.

The table still seems to work for larger creatures too. A Tarrasque, for example, is around 50-foot tall.

One important note: some pecies can be different sizes, depending on which version of the Player’s Handbook you’re using. In the 2024 rules, for example, Humans and Tieflings can be Small instead of Medium.

How to change DnD sizes

There are a few ways to shift size in Dungeons and Dragons:

• Enlarge/Reduce – A spell that increases or decreases your size by one category. If you play a Duergar, you can cast this spell without material components.
• Path of the Giant Barbarian 5e – Their subclass features can make them Large or even Huge.
• Rune Knight 5e – The ‘Giant’s Might’ feature can upgrade your size to Large.
• DnD Changeling – Their ‘Shapechanger’ feature allows them to choose between Medium and Small sizes.
• DnD Goliath – Starting at level five, a Goliath can spend a bonus action to change their size to Large for up to 10 minutes. This increases their speed by 10 feet and gives them advantage on Strength checks.

Some races also naturally appear larger or smaller without the need to actually change size. For example, the Bugbear’s ‘Powerful Build’ feature counts them as one size larger when calculating carrying capacity and the weight they can push, drag, or lift.

Similar abilities are also given to Firbolgs, Orcs, and Loxodons (as well as the pre-2024-rules Goliath). Centaurs also have a similar feature in the form of ‘Equine Build’, and the Giff version is ‘Hippo Build’.

Best DnD sizes

Let’s assume you are a Medium creature with the capability to grow larger or smaller. Which size is most optimal in D&D? It depends on what you’re trying to do.

Upping your size to Large offers many benefits:

• You can now grapple and pin Huge creatures – which could come in handy in certain boss battles.
• You occupy a two by two space on a gridded battlemap, meaning you have 12 squares within five feet of reach. That’s a vast increase in the reach of your regular (and opportunity) attacks.
• Your carrying, push, and lift capacity increase, which has some situational utility.
• You can wield weapons designed for Large creatures, which tend to do more damage than standard weapons. If you used the Enlarge/Reduce spell to change sizes, for example, your weapon attacks deal an extra 1d4 damage to simulate using a Large weapon.
• You provide better cover for allies, and you can move through the spaces of Small creatures with relative ease.

The downside is that you’re a much bigger target for enemies to hit, and trying to move through regular-sized doors and corridors at speed is going to be a major issue.

The only real benefits to being Small are stealth-based. You’ll find it easier to take cover, hide, and traverse tiny spaces, which is useful for scouting or escapes. That’s about where the benefits end, however. Unless you start out Small, there won’t be too much reason to shrink yourself – stick to getting bigger, if you want to change at all.

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