for the love of bare feet and vibram five fingers shoes.

[Update 7/27/09] The final word (From Vibram):

Below is a response to a direct query from a member of the VFF community regarding sizing differences across genders. I'd take this as the final word!

Original post with updates:

[Updated at 3:50 pm] I received the following question from a member of the facebook birthday shoes / Vibram fivefingers fan group:

An interesting question, here was my response:

Kristi,

Hey - I have a couple thoughts about this:

1) I talked to a couple where both have sprints. Based on the girl's eyeballing the two pairs of Sprints, the men's appear no wider than the women's.

2) There are no "wide" versions of VFFs. Vibram has said (though I can't put my finger on where) that people with wide feet should have no problem wearing regular VFFs b/c the way fivefingers are made allows them to expand widthwise without problem. About 40% of those who have responded to my survey (so far - if you haven't already, please take the fivefingers sizing/fit survey here! Only takes about five minutes.) have wide feed, and none of them cite it as a problem.

My hunch is that there is no substantial difference in the sole across genders (the only difference is really color options and max sizes). I've also heard of at least one guy getting Women's KSOs b/c they didn't have his Men's size in stock.

It's not an answer you can take to the bank, but I'm pretty sure you'd be ok -- the bigger concern should be just making sure you get the right size relative to your foot length, which is easier to do in person, but not impossible to do online (I got my first pair online).

Justin

That was my take (and hopefully my hunch is right). What say ye, the VFF community? Does anyone have a more definitive answer to Kristi's question?

Update 3:50 pm: Per Seret's comment below, women's VFFs may indeed be more narrow than men's:

So the jury is still out (or maybe in?).

Admin note: I got the grey KSOs, but secretly want the crazy blue ones!