How much yarn for amigurumi? Grams by finished size

The quick answer, by height and yarn

Find the row closest to your toy’s height and yarn. Every figure is a real toy from our list rather than a formula, so there are gaps: most rows rest on one to five toys, all but one by Irene Strange, and we found no aran toy over 20cm with a usage figure. Toys of a different shape, a tighter or looser crocheter, or another designer’s pattern can land outside these ranges. If your pattern states its own quantity, use that.

Height means the toy standing or sitting as the designer measured it. Long, flat animals such as crocodiles and turtles don’t fit a per-centimetre figure, so we left them out.

Where the numbers come from

We looked for toy patterns that give a finished height and the yarn actually used, in grams or metres, rather than a number of balls to buy. Twenty of the 22 come from the designer Irene Strange, who lists grams per colour or a yardage range on her Ravelry pages, and who also designed four of Paintbox Yarns’ free Halloween toys. For those four, the only usage figure is the yardage on their Ravelry entries. One is a doll by Alison North and one is Stylecraft’s Bruno the Bear. Where a page gives metres only, we converted to grams using the ball band of the yarn the designer names. A few quantities are partly whole balls, such as Bruno’s main colour, so they are an upper limit; the table marks them “up to”.

We haven’t made these toys ourselves. The quantities are the designers’ own, and every pattern is linked at the bottom of the page so you can check them. Because 20 of the 22 are by one designer, read the figures as one careful designer’s habits rather than an average across amigurumi.

Does one 50g ball do it?

In the three multicolour DK cotton toys of 13 to 16cm that split their quantities by colour, the main colour took 30 to 50g, so one 50g ball. Luna the Panda (13cm) uses 30g of her main colour and 15g of the contrast. Hettie the Hermit Crab (14cm) uses 35g of her main colour. Jules the Nautilus (16cm) lists 50g of the main colour, a whole ball, which leaves no margin for a tension swatch or a mistake.

Made in one colour, a 15cm toy can tip over a ball. Irene Strange gives about 65g for a single-colour Edward the Fiddler Crab, so that’s two balls. Her four aran cotton toys of 15 to 20cm all came out at 70g or more, so on that evidence plan on two 50g balls at that size.

Stylecraft’s Bruno the Bear is 40cm tall and, according to the LoveCrafts listing, needs one 100g ball of Special DK in the main colour, plus 10 to 20g of a second shade. That’s at most about 3g per centimetre, below every DK cotton toy in our list, though it’s a single slim standing bear and the 100g is a ball to buy, not a weighed amount.

Yarn thickness changes the grams more than the animal

Irene Strange’s Hugo the Hungry Frog shows it best, because she gives quantities for the same pattern in three yarns. Hugo is a hollow frog with a crocheted lining, so he takes more yarn than a stuffed toy his height. In Ricorumi DK on a 3mm hook he needs 55g. In Rico Creative Cotton Aran on a 3.75mm hook, where he is 11cm tall, he needs about 85g. In DROPS Snow, a wool at 50m per 50g, on a 6mm hook, he needs about 200g. That’s 1.5 and 3.6 times the smallest version.

June Gilbank of PlanetJune found the same with her gingerbread man. Holding two strands of worsted together made it 44% larger and it took 2.7 times as much yarn. A toy grows in every direction, so the yarn grows much faster than the height. That’s why the table only shows sizes we have toys for, and why a per-centimetre figure shouldn’t be stretched to a 60cm giant.

Chenille, fluffy and acrylic yarns: one example each

Only one pattern in our list gives quantities for the same toy in chenille and cotton, so this is one example rather than a rule. Barnaby the Donkey in Sirdar Happy Cotton lists five 20g balls, 100g and 215m, and stands 20cm. The chenille version lists four 15g balls of Sirdar Happy Chenille plus one 20g ball of Happy Cotton, 80g and 195m, and stands 22cm. Both are whole small balls, so actual use may be a little less. The ball bands point the same way: Happy Chenille gives about 2.5m per gram against 2.15m for Happy Cotton, so a metre of chenille weighs less.

Two toys use a fluffy chunky yarn for the body, and both list part of it as whole balls. Little Penguin Pip (28cm) lists a 100g ball of James C. Brett Flutterby Chunky, a 25g ball of Ricorumi DK in black and about 15g of white. Lulu the Panda (30cm) lists 100g of Flutterby Chunky, 100g of King Cole Cottonsoft DK and two small amounts more, about 230g in all, while her Ravelry entry gives 400 to 420m.

Bruno the Bear is the only all-acrylic toy we found with a usable quantity, and Ollie the Sloth’s main yarn is half acrylic, so we can’t say from these patterns how acrylic compares. On the ball bands, Stylecraft Special DK gives 295m per 100g against 250m for Paintbox Cotton DK, so the same length of acrylic weighs about 15% less. Weigh as you go to be sure.

Why pattern shopping lists look so much bigger

Free toy patterns from yarn brands usually list whole balls per colour. Paintbox Yarns asks for three 100g balls of Simply DK for Zachary the Frog, who is 18cm tall, because each of the three colours needs its own ball. That is 300g to buy for a toy that will use a fraction of it.

Boo the Ghost is the clearest case. The Paintbox pattern on LoveCrafts lists two 50g balls of Cotton Aran in the main colour and one each of two others, four balls or 200g, which is 340m. Boo’s Ravelry entry, under Irene Strange, gives a yardage of 190 to 200m. So if you already have the colours in your stash, the real quantity matters more than the ball count, and the yarn grams to metres tool will tell you whether a part ball is enough.

Hook size and weighing as you go

Toy patterns use a smaller hook than the ball band. Irene Strange’s DK cotton toys in our list use 3 or 3.5mm, and her aran cotton toys 3.75 or 4mm against 4.5mm on the Paintbox Cotton Aran band. Our hook size guide found 4mm for DK and 5mm for aran on most UK ball bands, and 3 or 3.5mm in Paintbox Yarns’ DK toy patterns. June Gilbank’s advice is to try a few rounds, push some stuffing behind them, and go down a size if the stuffing shows.

Weigh your ball before you start and again after the first big piece, usually the head or body. If the head took 20g and the pattern has a body of a similar size, you’ll know early if you’re going to run short. Stuffing isn’t counted in any of these figures. The only patterns we saw that give a finished weight are two small DROPS owls, about 8g and 10g each including their cotton wool filling.

Common questions

Sources and scope

• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/feathered-owl-friends
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/muffin-the-puffin-2
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/nutmeg-kitten
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/cynthia-doll
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/pufferfish-6
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/luna-the-panda
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/hettie-the-hermit-crab
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/edward-the-fiddler-crab
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/jules-the-nautilus
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/barnaby-the-donkey
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/echidna-3
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/ollie-the-sloth
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/mr-perry-the-platypus
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/hugo-the-hungry-frog
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/oscar-the-little-bat
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/pips-the-pumpkin
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/bernard-the-dinosaur
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/boo-the-fiendishly-friendly-ghost
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/little-penguin-pip
• www.ravelry.com/patterns/library/lulu-the-panda
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/crochet-bruno-the-bear-toy-in-stylecraft-special-dk-9669-downloadable-pdf
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/harriet-the-hedgehog-amigurumi-crochet-pattern-for-toys-in-paintbox-yarns-simply-dk-dk-cro-toy-004
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/sammy-the-snail-amigurumi-crochet-pattern-for-toys-in-paintbox-yarns-simply-dk-dk-cro-toy-006
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/zachary-the-frog-free-crochet-pattern-for-toys-in-paintbox-yarns-simply-dk-011
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/bobby-the-bee-free-amigurumi-crochet-toy-pattern-in-paintbox-yarns-simply-dk
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/lola-the-ladybird-free-amigurumi-crochet-toy-pattern-in-paintbox-yarns-simply-dk
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/boo-the-fiendishly-friendly-ghost-free-toy-crochet-pattern-for-halloween-in-paintbox-yarns-cotton-aran-by-paintbox-yarns
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/daisy-the-chick-free-toy-crochet-pattern-for-kids-in-paintbox-yarns-cotton-aran-by-paintbox-yarns
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/mollie-the-bunny-free-toy-crochet-pattern-for-kids-in-paintbox-yarns-cotton-aran-by-paintbox-yarns
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/norman-the-sheep-free-toy-crochet-pattern-for-kids-in-paintbox-yarns-cotton-aran-by-paintbox-yarns
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/paintbox-yarns-cotton-dk
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/paintbox-yarns-cotton-aran
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/stylecraft-special-dk
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/sirdar-happy-cotton
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/sirdar-happy-chenille
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/rico-creative-cotton-aran
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/james-c-brett-flutterby-chunky
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/debbie-bliss-baby-cashmerino
• www.lovecrafts.com/en-gb/products/dmc-natura-just-cotton
• www.garnstudio.com/yarn.php
• www.garnstudio.com/pattern.php
• www.planetjune.com/blog/amigurumi-help/resizing-amigurumi/
• www.planetjune.com/faq/yarn-and-hooks-for-amigurumi/how-do-i-choosesubstitute-yarn/
• www.planetjune.com/faq/yarn-and-hooks-for-amigurumi/what-is-worsted-weight-yarn-and-do-i-have-to-use-it/

Sources checked 1 October 2026. Label facts come from the linked references; worked purchase examples and arithmetic are our own illustrations.