How tall is Tom Holland?

How tall is Tom Holland?

Tom Holland is listed on this site at 173 cm (5′8″), the figure recorded on Wikidata and cited from a 2022 report by the Polish broadcaster RMF FM. That article, which compared Holland and Zendaya with earlier Hollywood couples in which the woman is taller, put Holland at 173 cm and Zendaya about 5 cm above him. The same number appears widely in English-language coverage of the actor, and there is no published official measurement from Marvel Studios or Sony that contradicts it.

In imperial units 173 cm is 5′8.1″, so you will usually see Holland described as 5′8″. Occasionally an outlet rounds to 5′7″ or 5′9″, especially when estimating from photographs, but the 5′8″ listing has been the stable reference since his casting as Spider-Man in 2015.

From Billy Elliot to Spider-Man: a career built on movement

Holland was born on June 1, 1996, in Kingston upon Thames in south-west London. His mother, Nicola, is a photographer and his father, Dominic Holland, is a comedian and author. He began dancing at age nine and, after being spotted at a dance festival in Richmond, spent two years training in ballet, tap and acrobatics before joining Billy Elliot the Musical in London's West End. He debuted as Billy's friend Michael in June 2008 at the Victoria Palace Theatre and was soon promoted to the title role, which he played until 2010. He also learned gymnastics during the run.

That background matters for understanding why his height was never a barrier. Dance and gymnastics reward strength relative to body size, flexibility, balance and timing. Smaller, lighter performers often have an advantage in tumbling and acrobatics because they rotate faster and land with less force, and Holland's 173 cm frame is well suited to the backflips and parkour-style movement he became known for. According to Wikipedia's account of his casting, the Russo brothers specifically cited his dance and gymnastics skills when choosing him to play Peter Parker.

His screen debut came in The Impossible (2012), the tsunami drama co-starring Naomi Watts and Ewan McGregor, in which he played a teenager caught in the 2004 Indian Ocean disaster. He was cast as Spider-Man in 2015 and first appeared in Captain America: Civil War (2016), followed by Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019) and Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021), the highest-grossing film of its year.

A young-looking Peter Parker

Holland was 19 when he was cast and played Peter Parker as a 15-year-old high school student in his first appearances. His height and youthful appearance helped him read convincingly as a teenager on screen, a key part of Marvel's plan to reboot the character as younger than in previous film versions. Wikipedia notes that Spider-Man co-creator Stan Lee reportedly said Holland was the "exact age and height" he had envisioned for the character.

Tom Holland and Zendaya: the height difference

The best-known height comparison involving Holland is with Zendaya, his co-star in the Spider-Man films, who plays MJ. Zendaya is listed on this site at 178 cm (5′10″), about 5 cm (2 inches) taller than Holland. The two met on the set of Spider-Man: Homecoming, confirmed their relationship in November 2021, and became engaged in December 2024; in 2026, according to Wikipedia's summary of the reporting, Holland confirmed in an Esquire UK interview that they had married.

The RMF FM article that supplies the site's figure framed the couple as part of a Hollywood "trend" of taller women and shorter men, pointing back to Tom Cruise (170 cm) and Nicole Kidman, who were married from 1990 to 2001. In everyday life, a 5 cm difference in either direction is small enough that most people would not notice it in conversation; it is roughly the height of a typical pair of sneakers' heel stack plus a little more.

On red carpets the gap often looks bigger because Zendaya frequently wears high heels with formal gowns, which can add 8 to 12 cm. With a 10 cm heel, she would stand about 188 cm, putting her eye line roughly 15 cm above Holland's if he is in flat dress shoes. In the Spider-Man films, the difference is barely visible because scenes are staged and framed with the actors close together.

You can try the exact figures with the height difference calculator, or read more about her on the Zendaya height page.

Holland next to the other Spider-Men and his Marvel co-stars

Holland is one of three actors to play Peter Parker in live-action films in the 21st century. His height is almost identical to that of Tobey Maguire, who played the role from 2002 to 2007. The table below uses the heights on this site and the official comic-book height of the character.

Holland and Robert Downey Jr.

One of the less-noticed details of the MCU is that Holland and Robert Downey Jr., whose Tony Stark became Peter Parker's mentor, are both listed at 173 cm. Their scenes together in Captain America: Civil War, Homecoming and Avengers: Infinity War have them standing essentially eye to eye, even though Stark is written as an imposing figure. In the comics, Stark is listed at 6′1″ out of armor, so both actors are smaller than the characters they play.

Holland and the earlier Spider-Men

In Spider-Man: No Way Home, Holland shared the screen with Tobey Maguire and Andrew Garfield, the two previous film Spider-Men. Holland and Maguire are essentially the same height, and the scenes of the three Spider-Men side by side drew fan attention partly because the actors are close enough in height that no one dominates the frame. Garfield is not yet in the site's database, so he is not included in the table.

Compared with the average British man

According to the NCD Risk Factor Collaboration, British men born in 1996, Holland's birth year, reached an average adult height of 177.5 cm (5′10″). Holland's 173 cm is about 4.5 cm (1.8 inches) below that cohort average. British women of the same cohort averaged 164.4 cm, so Holland is around 9 cm taller than the typical British woman of his generation.

Over the long term, British men have grown considerably taller. The same dataset shows men born in 1896 averaging 166.9 cm, so Holland would have been notably tall for a Briton born at the end of the 19th century. You can explore the full trend on the United Kingdom average height page.

Playing a 15-year-old: why 173 cm reads as a teenager

Holland's Peter Parker was introduced as a 15-year-old, and a teenage hero is a different proposition from an adult one when it comes to height. According to the CDC's 2000 growth charts, the median American boy is about 170 cm tall at age 15 and about 174 cm at 16. Holland's adult 173 cm is therefore almost exactly what a typical mid-teen boy measures, which helped him pass as a high schooler well into his twenties. Taller actors in their twenties tend to look older on screen, partly because adult proportions and height are among the cues audiences use to estimate age.

The comic-book Peter Parker, by contrast, is listed in Marvel's handbooks at 5′10″ (177.8 cm), a height that describes the adult character. Over the course of the Homecoming trilogy, Peter ages from about 15 to 17 or 18, and a real teenager would typically still add a few centimeters during those years. Holland, already fully grown, simply stayed the same height, and nobody noticed, because the films never measured him against anything that would reveal it.

How 173 cm compares around the world

A height of 173 cm sits at very different points of the distribution depending on where you are. Using the NCD-RisC averages for men born in 1996 that power this site's country pages:

• In the Netherlands, where men average 182.5 cm, Holland would be almost 10 cm below average.
• In Germany (179.9 cm) and France (179.7 cm), he would be around 7 cm shorter than the typical man.
• In the United States (177.1 cm) and Italy (177.8 cm), the gap shrinks to about 4 to 5 cm.
• In Brazil (173.6 cm) he would be almost exactly average, and in South Korea (174.9 cm) only slightly below.
• In Japan (170.8 cm), China (171.8 cm) and India (164.9 cm), he would be taller than the average man.

The point is not that Holland is short; it is that "average" depends heavily on the population you compare against. A 173 cm man is ordinary in most of the world and only reads as below average in northern and western Europe and among the tallest national populations.

Why Holland's height suits action roles

Stunt work and fight choreography are often easier for performers of moderate height and weight. A 173 cm actor can be lifted on wires, thrown in harnesses and doubled by stunt performers more easily than a much larger one, and close-quarters fight scenes look faster when the performers are compact. Holland's gymnastics background allowed him to perform many of Spider-Man's flips himself, and his size is part of why the character's acrobatics look natural on screen.

His later roles have played with physicality in different ways. In Uncharted (2022), he played the treasure hunter Nathan Drake opposite Mark Wahlberg, who is the same listed height. In 2024 he returned to the London stage as Romeo in Jamie Lloyd's West End production of Romeo and Juliet, a twelve-week run that once again relied on his stage training rather than on screen tricks.

Stage acting puts height in a different light again. In a theater there are no camera angles to adjust how tall an actor appears, so stage productions rely on blocking, costume and set design instead. Holland's two West End engagements, more than a decade apart, bookend a career in which his height has been an asset for movement-heavy roles rather than something to disguise.

For other actors around this height, try the homepage's 3D comparison tool, or browse the celebrity heights hub.