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Yarn weight and Wrap Per Inch tool

 When we want to knit or crochet something, we need to know the yarn

weight, so we can determine what size needles/hook we should use. We all know that for thin yarn, we usually need to use small size needles/hooks, and for thick material we need to use big needles/hooks. Of course when we have a really thin yarn, we know that we can't use 10mm needles/hook. And vice versa: for thick yarn, we can't use 2mm needles/hook.

When we use a pattern for our project, the designer usually tells us what type of yarn we should use, and what is the yarn weight s/he recommends for the project.


North-Americans, Brits and Australians use different name for the yarn weight. But the symbols on the labels are the same in every continent/countries.




What other information can the yarn weight give us about the yarn:
Different weight has different gauge with the recommended needles/hook.
When we work with thinner yarn, we need more stitches to get the 10cm (4") swatch. And of course the thicker the yarn, we need less stitches to get 10cm (4") swatch.
When we look at the label of the yarn, it always tells us the recommended needle/hook size for the gauge on the label. (Once I had German yarn that did not tell me the gauge, but I was able to look for the information online.)

Different yarn weight has different gauge
What is a WPI (wrap per inch) tool? And how to use it
WPI is a great little tool to help us determine the yarn weight of a material if we don't have labels for it.
After 35+ years of knitting, I can tell by looking at the yarn, what weight category it belongs to, but not all the time. That's when I get my little tool out, and check the wrap per inch of the yarn. The most commonly used yarn is the #4 (Medium, Worsted, Aran, 10 ply), but when the yarn is thinner than the average #4, it's difficult to tell if it's #3 or #4.

How to use the WPI tool?
Wrap the yarn around the tool (as shown in the pic), than count how many wraps you can make. In the pictures I could wrap the yarn around the tool 14 times. As you can see in the table below, it means that this yarn is a #3, light weight yarn.

Why it is important to know the yarn weight?

When a pattern tells us that we need to use #4 (Medium, Worsted, Aran, 10 ply) yarn, that means that we probably need 4.5mm -5.5mm needles, or 5.5mm-6.5mm hook for that particular
Checking your gauge is so important!
project. (you can check the table below for the US and UK needles/hook sizes as well). But those numbers are just for references. Everybody has different tension, especially when we work on a lace pattern, so checking the gauge is a MUST !

If you're a beginner crafter the table below can be a great help for you for any of your project. If you're an advanced crafter, you probably know your tension by now, and you don't need to use this table often, but it's a really good cheat sheet.



Here's the table with all the information I talked about
Hope this blogpost helped you understand the weight of the yarn, and that the tables above will be great help for you. If you have any questions, pls feel free to reach out!

Where to buy WPI tool?


If you're interested in my craft, check out my social media accounts: https://linktr.ee/ErikaDesign

Thank you for reading!





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