Fall Coats for Tall Men: Three Cargo and Waxed Jackets, Measured at 6′8″

A fall coat and a winter coat are not the same purchase, and the tall sizing problem hits them differently. I bought three jackets built for the in-between weather — two cargo coats and a waxed cotton field jacket — and put a tape on all three at 6′8″, 285 lb.

Two of the three measured smaller around the chest than my bare chest. Not tight. Smaller. That is not a fit opinion, it is subtraction, and it is what a non-tall 2XL does to a tall man.

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Why a fall coat is a different spec

A winter coat has to clear a sweater. That single requirement is what sent most of my winter coats back — the chest has to be big enough to close over a mid-layer, and almost nothing publishes that number.

A fall coat does not have that job. It goes over a shirt, or a shirt and a light knit. So the chest floor is lower and a coat that fails as a winter coat can still be the right jacket in October. The mistake is buying one as the other.

What does not relax is the shoulder. My shoulder measures 24 inches point to point across the back, and no amount of mild weather changes that.

The three, measured

Measured flat and unstretched, every figure in inches. Chest "around" is the flat figure doubled — it is the coat’s circumference, not mine.

The number that ends it before you try it on

My bare chest is 52.5 to 53 inches around.

The Invachi measures 52 around. The CRRYSULLY measures 50. Both jackets are smaller than my chest before I put a shirt on. There is no size-up, no break-in, no layering trick. They were never going to close.

And both are fleece lined, which makes it worse in a way the tape does not show. Chest-around is taped across the outside of the coat, so the lining sits inside that figure. The usable room is less than 52 and less than 50 — by how much, I cannot tell you, because I did not measure the lining thickness and I am not going to guess at it.

This is the whole argument for tall sizing in one line: a 2XL is a big size, and big is not the same as tall. Neither of these was a tall size, and neither was close.

The listings I ordered from: the Invachi military fleece cargo and the CRRYSULLY fleece lined cargo. Both sellers list sizes above the 2XL I bought. If you go looking, check the seller’s chest figure against your own chest first — that is the number that decided both of these, and it is the one measurement a size chart will not do for you.

The other one nobody checks: where it actually stops

The CRRYSULLY’s hem finished two inches above my navel. A cargo coat that stops above your navel is not a short coat, it is the wrong garment. The Invachi landed four inches below the waist, which is a real jacket length — it simply could not close.

The one that was right, for the wrong season

The Legendary Whitetails waxed cotton jacket is the interesting one, because nothing was wrong with the fit. A 2XT gave a 56 chest, a 22 shoulder and a 28 sleeve that landed at the wrist bone, and the hem sat at mid-seat. It was the most expensive of the coats I bought that round.

I sent it back anyway, and the reason was the calendar. It is excellent in wet weather from the mid thirties down to about twenty degrees, and no colder. I was shopping for a winter coat. This is a fall coat, and a good one.

It does not close over a sweater — 56 around is not enough for that. For October over a shirt, it does not need to.

Buy it if you want a wet-weather fall jacket with a hood and you are shopping in a 2XT. Do not if this is meant to be the coat that gets you through January, because it is not.

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What to check on a fall coat listing, in order

• Chest, around. Compare it to your own bare chest, not to your shirt size. If the coat’s figure is not comfortably larger than yours, stop there. Mine is 52.5–53; two of these three were below that.
• Is it lined? A fleece or quilted lining sits inside the chest figure. Same number, less room.
• Shoulder, seam to seam. Mine is 24 across the back. Under 22 has failed every time on me, and no alteration fixes a shoulder.
• Body length, back. A flat figure is not a distance on your body — some of it is spent crossing the shoulder blades. On my coats that loss ran three to six inches.
• The word “tall” in the size. 2XL and 2XT are different garments. The two that failed here were the ones without the T.

If a listing gives you a chest but no shoulder, ask for the shoulder. It is the one number that decides the coat on its own.

Every measurement above is in the Tall Sizing Database, alongside the rest of what I have taped. The ten winter coats and sweaters are in Coats and Sweaters for Tall Men, and everything with a working link is on the Tall Deals page.

A flat back-length figure is not where the hem lands on you. The arithmetic for that — what each coat length actually does on a 6′8″ frame — is in Coat Lengths for Tall Men.

The two cargo jackets are linked above so you can see the listings I measured. Neither is a recommendation at 2XL — the point of this article is that 2XL was the wrong size, and the figure to check before you order anything is the chest.