How To Grow 5 Inches Taller (Not Everyone Can)

If you’re looking for a proven, step-by-step guide that will show you how to grow 5 inches taller in 2 weeks—or anything remotely similar—then I’m afraid that you’re going to be disappointed.

But if you want some advice that can make you grow taller during puberty and look physically taller during adulthood, then this article is for you.

Learn More About Growing Taller:

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How to grow 5 inches taller in height

Most people will not be able to experience a 5 inch height increase (or anything close to such an increase) unless they still have many years of growth ahead of them.

This is because the growth plates close soon after puberty, a process that prevents you from getting any taller. ^[1]

Of course, this naturally means that there are some individuals out there—whose growth plates are open—who do have the genetics to get 5 inches taller, but not in a week or a month or anything like that.

Eat a proper, whole foods diet

Let me ask you a question: All else being equal, do you think that a healthy body is more likely to produce substantial height growth than an unhealthy body?

Of course it is!

Restricting your calorie intake (i.e., starving yourself) and depriving your body of the nutrients that it needs to develop is likely to stunt your growth to some extent.

But since height is largely genetic, It’s important that you understand that a large part of growing 5 inches taller or just growing taller, in general, comes down to not messing it up (i.e., not squandering this prime opportunity for height growth).

So make sure to eat a wide variety of healthy foods.

Fruits, vegetables, oats, brown rice, potatoes, fatty fish, lean meats, red meats, eggs, dairy, beans, nuts, and seeds—I could go on—are all brilliant examples of nutritious foods that will develop a healthy body that’s capable of reaching its full height potential.

Exercise intensely

Intense exercise leads to a surge of growth hormone, which is one of the key hormones for growing taller.

Now, this massive HGH spike will obviously go back to baseline later on, so it’s debatable whether or not these transient growth hormone increases will directly affect your height.

But since intense workouts, presuming sufficient nutrition and sleep, almost certainly won’t negatively affect your height—and there could be a benefit to them—you might as well train intensely by doing some kind of sprints, whether that’s on an exercise bike or out on the field.

I recommend daily exercise for optimizing your health and HGH output. But some days, you definitely want to take it a bit easier so that you don’t burn out.

So if you’ve just done sprints the day before, maybe do some kind of upper body workout the next day to give your legs a break.

Resistance training won’t lengthen your bones, but it will increase your bone density, which is why any good exercise routine should include both aerobic activity and strength training.

Hope that you’re still going through puberty

A boy and girl standing back to back in order to measure their heights

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again; you won’t grow five inches taller if your epiphyseal plates have fused.

So if you’re in your late teens, your best bet is to simply optimize—to the best of your ability—your sleeping habits, exercise routine, and food intake.

This way, you’ll be setting yourself up well for any possible height increase (it certainly won’t be 5 inches) that your genetics will allow.

Make sleep a top priority

If you’re a growing teenager that constantly feels sleepy, then you’re almost certainly not getting sufficient sleep. ^[2]

Not only can sleep deprivation make it hard to concentrate in class; missing out on vital sleep can also suppress growth hormone production.

Now, a night of bad sleep here or there is certainly not going to affect your height. But if your sleep deprivation becomes chronic, then it’s plausible that your lack of recovery could negatively influence your height and overall physical development.

Aim for a solid 9-10 hours of sleep if you want to be at your best and set yourself up for maximum height growth success.

I can’t promise that sleeping more will make you grow 5 inches taller—in any time span—but it will most definitely make you more alert, which will boost your exercise performance and post-workout recovery.

Make significant posture improvements

A man demonstrating how to have good posture

Having poor posture makes you look shorter and less confident. Who wants that?

And did you also know that sitting with poor posture decreases your exercise performance?

It’s true. Researchers found that those who sat with poor posture had trouble performing push-ups. ^[3]

So if you want to be at your physical best, try to stretch daily in order to straighten your spine and unlock your maximum skeletal height.

Wear special height-increasing shoes and insoles

Hopefully, you know by now that nobody who’s finished puberty can grow 5 inches taller.

But that’s not to say that you can’t elevate yourself by a few inches.

There might be some social stigma around these products, but height-increasing insoles and shoes can give you the confidence boost that you’re most likely looking for.

And there’s no need to go overboard, either.

By wearing a shoe with a good heel and improving your posture, you could definitely add a couple of inches to your barefoot height. Add in some thick insoles, and that could well rise much closer to five inches.

See Also: 5 inch height difference

Why would someone want to be 5 inches taller?

A businessman holding his hand above his head

If someone believes that they’re really short, then they might want to get 5 inches taller so that they can gain access to the supposed rewards of being tall.

Some people believe that being tall leads to a more successful career and more social respect. This may well be true in some places, but there are also plenty of examples of short individuals who have very successful and happy lives.

Now, as I said, you can make yourself a bit taller by straightening out your spine, but this very modest height increase will be nowhere near the five-inch mark. Indeed, it probably won’t even be a single inch.

So if you’re intent on growing 5 inches taller in 2 weeks or something like that, then the only way to do it is to make use of height-increasing quick fixes like shoes and insoles.

The verdict: Is growing 5 inches taller realistic or not?

So, can you actually grow 5 inches taller? Unless you’re currently going through puberty, then it’s not possible to grow 5 inches taller in any timeframe.

While there are some examples of individuals who grew 5 inches taller towards the end of puberty, such natural growth—or even a fraction of such growth—isn’t possible if your growth plates have closed.

Ultimately, while there’s no method out there that will teach you how to grow 5 inches taller, you can stand tall and walk confidently to improve people’s perception of you and your physique.

References

Karimian, E., Chagin, A. S., & Sävendahl, L. (2012). Genetic regulation of the growth plate. Frontiers in endocrinology, 2, 113. https://doi.org/10.3389/fendo.2011.00113
Teens and sleep: Why you need it and how to get enough. (2008). Paediatrics & child health, 13(1), 69–72. https://doi.org/10.1093/pch/13.1.69
Lu, L., Robinson, M., Tan, Y., Goonewardena, K., Guo, X., Mareels, I., & Oetomo, D. (2020). Effective Assessments of a Short-Duration Poor Posture on Upper Limb Muscle Fatigue Before Physical Exercise. Frontiers in physiology, 11, 541974. https://doi.org/10.3389/fphys.2020.541974