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The real embroidery field for common machine embroidery machines and hoops, including magnetic Mighty Hoops — the area the needle can actually reach, which is smaller than the hoop — in both inches and millimeters. Enter a design's size and see every hoop it fits. It's free and there's no signup. Nothing you type leaves your browser.
Enter the design's stitched size and the chart below will mark every hoop it fits in, counting either orientation, since most machines can rotate a design on screen.
| Brand | Machine or hoop | Field (inches) | Field (mm) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Brother | PE535Max field | 4" x 4" | 100 x 100 mm |
| Brother | SE600 / SE700Max field | 4" x 4" | 100 x 100 mm |
| Brother | PE800Max field | 5" x 7" | 130 x 180 mm |
| Brother | PE900Max field | 5" x 7" | 130 x 180 mm |
| Brother | Stellaire XJ2Max field | 9.5" x 14" | 241 x 356 mm |
| Brother | PR680W (6-needle)Max field | 8" x 12" | 200 x 300 mm |
| Brother | PR1055X (10-needle)Max field | 9.5" x 14" | 241 x 356 mm |
| Baby Lock | AuroraMax field | 4" x 4" | 100 x 100 mm |
| Baby Lock | FlareMax field | 6.25" x 10.25" | 160 x 260 mm |
| Baby Lock | AltairMax field | 9.5" x 14" | 241 x 356 mm |
| Baby Lock | SolarisMax field | 10.6" x 16" | 269 x 406 mm |
| Janome | SQ14b hoopMC500E / MC550E | 5.5" x 5.5" | 140 x 140 mm |
| Janome | RE20b hoopMC500E / MC550E | 5.5" x 7.9" | 140 x 200 mm |
| Janome | SQ20b hoopMC500E / MC550E | 7.9" x 7.9" | 200 x 200 mm |
| Janome | RE28b hoopMC500E / MC550E | 7.9" x 11" | 200 x 280 mm |
| Janome | RE36b hoopMC550E only | 7.9" x 14.2" | 200 x 360 mm |
| Bernina | Small free-arm hoopField, not the plastic | 2" x 2.8" | 50 x 72 mm |
| Bernina | Large oval hoopField, not the plastic | 5.7" x 10" | 145 x 255 mm |
| Bernina | Midi hoopField, not the plastic | 6.5" x 10.5" | 165 x 265 mm |
| Bernina | Mega hoopField, not the plastic | 6" x 15.75" | 150 x 400 mm |
| Husqvarna Viking | Splendid Square hoopDesigner series | 4.7" x 4.7" | 120 x 120 mm |
| Husqvarna Viking | Crown hoopDesigner series | 7.9" x 10.2" | 200 x 260 mm |
| Husqvarna Viking | Imperial hoopDesigner series | 10.25" x 14.2" | 260 x 360 mm |
| Ricoma | EM-1010Max field | 8.3" x 12.2" | 210 x 310 mm |
| Melco | EMT16XMax field | 15.7" x 16.1" | 399 x 409 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 4 x 6"Magnetic | approx. 3.2" x 5.2" | 82 x 132 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 5.5" squareMagnetic | approx. 4.8" x 4.8" | 122 x 122 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 6.5" squareMagnetic | approx. 5.7" x 5.7" | 145 x 145 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 9 x 3"Magnetic · sleeve, mounts vertical | approx. 8.1" x 2.2" | 205 x 56 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 9 x 4.25"Magnetic · sleeve, mounts vertical | approx. 8.1" x 3.5" | 205 x 88 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 5 x 10.25"Magnetic · mounts horizontal | approx. 4.2" x 9.6" | 107 x 243 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 8 x 9"Magnetic | approx. 7.6" x 8.4" | 193 x 213 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 10" squareMagnetic | approx. 8.9" x 8.9" | 225 x 225 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 8 x 13"Magnetic · needs 480 mm arm | approx. 6.9" x 12" | 174 x 305 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 13 x 4.25"Magnetic · sleeve, mounts vertical | approx. 12.25" x 3.5" | 310 x 88 mm |
| Mighty Hoop | 16 x 4.25"Magnetic · sleeve, mounts vertical | approx. 15.25" x 3.5" | 391 x 88 mm |
Every dimension here is the embroidery field — the area the needle can actually reach — as the manufacturer publishes it, not the size of the plastic. If your machine isn't listed, its manual and the manufacturer's spec page state the field the same way.
Magnetic Mighty Hoop rows are marked approx.because the maker publishes those areas as approximate: how close the needle can get to the magnetic wall shifts a little with your machine's arm spacing and presser-foot height. The hoop's area is the same whichever brand's bracket you buy — only the mounting arm differs — so each size is listed once.
This is the single most common point of confusion in machine embroidery, and it costs people real money when they buy a machine or quote a job around the wrong number. The hoop is the plastic frame. The embroidery field — some brands say sewing field or embroidery area — is the region inside it that the needle can actually reach. The field is always the smaller number, and the field is the only number that matters when you're deciding whether a design fits.
The gap exists because the machine moves the hoop, not the needle. The hoop travels on an arm, and the machine has to keep the needle clear of the frame on all four sides, so the usable area stops short of the plastic. On top of that, brands name their hoops inconsistently. A Brother "4x4" is named for its field: you really can stitch 4 x 4 inches in it, and the plastic is bigger. A Janome SQ20b is named for its field in centimeters — 20 cm square, or 7.9 inches. Bernina names hoops Small, Midi, Large, and Mega, and publishes the field separately. The chart above cuts through all of it by listing only the field, for every row, in both units.
When a machine says "includes a 5x7 hoop," the number to find in the spec sheet is the maximum embroidery area. On most single-needle home machines they match — a 5x7 machine stitches 5 x 7 inches (130 x 180 mm). The trap is the other direction: a machine ships with a small hoop but supports a bigger field with a hoop sold separately, or a machine's largest hoop is bigger than what an accessory like a border frame can use. If you're buying, the question that settles it is always "what is the largest field this machine can stitch in one hooping, and which hoop does that take?"
A 4x4 inch (100 x 100 mm) field is the entry point, and it covers more paying work than people expect: left-chest logos, cap fronts, names on stockings and towels, pocket designs, and small keepsake pieces. A 5x7(130 x 180 mm) adds room for larger monograms, blanket corners, and most single-placement retail work — it's the size where a home-based embroidery business stops bumping into the frame every week. An 8x12 (200 x 300 mm) field, typical of entry commercial machines, handles jacket backs and hoop art. Past that, fields like 9.5x14 and up are about stitching large layouts in one hooping instead of splitting them.
Fabric only stays put where the hoop grips it. In a hoop much bigger than the design, the fabric in the middle is supported by stabilizer alone, and thousands of needle strikes will flex it. That shows up as puckering around the design and as outlines that don't quite land on their fills. A hoop close to the design's size keeps tension across the whole stitching area. That's the reason machines ship with several hoops rather than one big one, and it's why the fit checker above tells you every hoop that fits instead of just the biggest.
A 100 x 100 mm design in a 100 x 100 mm field fits, technically, with zero room to adjust. In practice you want breathing room for basting boxes, for nudging the design to line up with where it actually needs to sit on the garment, and for the fabric drawing in slightly as it stitches. When a design fills the field edge to edge, treat it as a size up: either shrink the design a touch or plan on the next hoop.
Magnetic hoops clamp the fabric between two magnetic frames instead of squeezing it between two rings you tighten by hand. They hold thick, bulky, and awkward items that a standard hoop fights you on — sweatshirt sleeves, bag panels, towels, jacket fronts — and they hoop in one motion, which is why shops that stitch all day tend to buy a wall of them. Mighty Hoops are the common ones, and the chart above lists them under their own brand row.
Two things about them trip people up. The first is that a magnetic hoop's embroidery area is published as approximate, because the needle's clearance depends on the height of the magnetic wall and how close your machine's presser foot can pass to it. The second is the sizing gap, and it is bigger than on standard hoops: a hoop sold as 9 x 3 gives you about 8.1 x 2.2 inches to stitch in. That two-and-a-bit inches of height is the reason people buy the 9 x 3 for sleeve work and then find themselves using the 9 x 4.25 — same length, but 3.5 inches of height instead.
Buy the bracket for your machine, not just the size. The hoop is identical across brands; what changes is the arm it bolts to, and those are sold by arm spacing — commonly 360, 400, 480, or 500 mm. The bigger hoops need the wider arms, which is why an 8 x 13 isn't offered for every machine. Narrow sleeve hoops also mount in a fixed orientation, long side running toward you rather than left to right, so a design that fits on paper still has to be rotated the right way in your software.
Field size is a quoting question, not just a hardware question. A customer asking for a 12-inch back design on a 5x7 machine isn't a small job — it's a split-and-rehoop job with alignment risk, or it's a no. Knowing your exact field means you can answer "can you do this?" on the spot, and price the jobs near your limit for the extra handling they take. If the design has to be resized to fit, confirm the new size with the customer before anything is digitized, because stitch count — and therefore the price — moves with it.
For working out that price once you know it fits, the embroidery pricing calculator does the math from stitch count, blank cost, hooping, and digitizing.
The chart lists machines and hoops whose field dimensions we could verify against the manufacturer's published specs, and it'll grow. Every manufacturer publishes the field the same way: it's in the manual under maximum embroidery area, and on the spec tab of the machine's product page. Measure nothing with a ruler — the plastic will lie to you. Find the published field, and if you'd like your machine added to this chart, email hello@broidry.com with the model and we'll verify it and add it.
Because the hoop size and the embroidery field are two different measurements. The plastic frame of a "4x4" hoop is physically bigger than four inches, and on many brands the area the needle can actually reach is smaller than the hoop's inner opening, because the machine needs clearance to move the hoop without the needle hitting the frame. Manufacturers name hoops by the field on some brands and by the frame on others, which is exactly the confusion this chart exists to settle. Every number on this page is the field.
A 4x4 inch (100 x 100 mm) field covers it. Left-chest logos run about 3 to 4 inches wide, which is why 4x4 machines like the Brother PE535 and SE600 stay useful long after people expect to outgrow them. Where a 4x4 machine runs out of room is jacket backs, large hoop-art pieces, and multi-placement layouts you'd rather stitch in one hooping.
Yes. A hoop close to the design's size holds the fabric tighter across the whole stitching area, which means less shifting, less puckering, and cleaner registration when the design has multiple colors that need to line up. Stitching a 3-inch design in an 8x12 hoop leaves a lot of loosely supported fabric flexing with every needle strike. The fit checker on this page marks every hoop your design fits so you can pick the smallest.
Yes, by splitting it. Embroidery software can cut a large design into sections that each fit your field, and you re-hoop between sections and line them up using alignment stitches. It works, and people stitch jacket backs on 5x7 machines this way, but every re-hoop is a chance for the sections to land a little off, so it takes patience and a fabric that hoops squarely. For work you sell, a design that fits your field in one hooping is always the safer quote.
Only if they're made for your machine's attachment system. Hoops mount to a brand's specific arm and are keyed to tell the machine which hoop is installed, so the machine knows where the needle is allowed to go. Third-party companies do make hoops for specific machines, including magnetic hoops that grip thick or hard-to-hoop items, and those are fine as long as they're sold for your exact model. A hoop for a different brand won't attach, and forcing an unkeyed hoop risks the needle striking the frame.
The 9 x 4.25 inch is the one most people end up reaching for, because the 9 x 3 only gives you about 2.2 inches of usable height and you run out of room fast on anything past a short name. The width isn't usually what limits you on a sleeve — the narrow side of the hoop is what has to slide inside the sleeve, and 4.25 inches still goes in easily. Long-sleeve cuffs in small sizes are the tight ones. If you're stitching down the length of a sleeve rather than across it, the 13 x 4.25 and 16 x 4.25 give you the same 3.5 inch height with far more length.
They follow the same rule — the field is smaller than the frame — but the gap comes from a different place. On a standard hoop the machine needs clearance to move the frame past the needle. On a magnetic hoop the limit is the height of the magnetic wall and how close the presser foot can pass to it, which is why makers publish magnetic hoop areas as approximate and note that they shift slightly by machine. One thing that does not change is the hoop itself: a 5.5 inch Mighty Hoop has the same embroidery area whether you buy the Melco, Brother, Tajima, or SWF version. Only the mounting bracket differs, and it has to match your machine's arm spacing.
It's just under 4 x 4 inches — one inch is 25.4 mm. Embroidery design files are usually sized in millimeters, and machine specs in the US are usually quoted in inches, so you end up converting constantly. That's why this chart shows both units for every hoop, and why the fit checker accepts either.
Broidry is order-management software for machine embroidery shops. Every order carries its design, its placement, and its size in one place, so "what did we agree on" is never a scroll back through three message threads. Orders from Etsy, Facebook, text, and email land on one list with a price, a status, and a due date.
The chart above stays free either way.