Welcome to the section where we report the questions of our readers, with expert advice. The reader who’s writing to us needs to get some further information on Mondopoint system.
Let’s start with an assumption:
Every foot has its own shape and any worker should wear the right safety shoes with the appropriate width.
What is the Mondopoint system?
Given the lack of legislation on the width of safety footwear, manufacturers refer to a standard called the Mondopoint system.
The Mondopoint system is mainly used to measure the length of safety shoes, but also provides a table on the width of safety shoes drawn up according to the length of the foot.
Further information on Mondopoint system

Here is the message we received from our reader:
Hey there
Saw your article on Mondopoint and it was very helpful, thank you!
There’s a pair of saftey shoes over in the UK/IE that I would like to buy. But I’m in the US.
I’ve been reading about the conversions and such and here is where I’m confused.
In the US, I wear a 12 wide (12W or 12EE) depending on who makes the boot. This company is saying their boots go up to EU47, which if I did the conversion right, then I would need an EU46.
With that said, the width they say is Mondopoint 11 on all of their boots. From reading your article, it appears the mondopoint width scales a bit with the length of the foot, which makes sense.
Correct me if I’m wrong here, but doing the math starting from 42, I got the following:
EU46 is 302 mm long at Mondopoint 11 makes it 272 mm circumference.
Does that seem right?
Thanks in advance for your reply!
Nick
Hello Nick,
let me make it simple for you because Mondopoint scales are used for both lenght and width.
The width 11 Mondopoint in Europe is like an EE width in the US. So they should work out well for you. I guess your foot is wide but not extra wide, right?
Regarding the size conversion, most of safety shoes have a double sizing (EU, US or EU, UK) on the internal label. Why don’t you ask the vendor to check it out and let you know?
However for your safety I think it would be better that you “commit a mistake” taking a size more, than a bigger mistake taking a size less, otherwise your nails would be very uncomfortable… In safety shoes you need to be quite careful!
One last thing, the European safety shoes follow the European norm 20345, the US follow the ASTM. They are different things, are you sure you can wear European shoes on your work site?
Thanks for reading SafetyShoesToday and I wish you’ll sign up to the newsletter!
Best Regards,
Robert
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If you need further information on Mondopoint system or any other clarification on safety shoes and safety footwear, please feel free to email us at Robert.Frog@safetyshoestoday.com.
We will be more than happy to send you our best advice!
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