Chanel Boy Bag Size Guide: Mini, Small, Old Medium, New Medium and Large Dimensions

Catalog note: Album entries can change. Use the live album link and WhatsApp to confirm the current option before ordering.

The Chanel Boy runs six tier names — Mini (15 x 10 x 6 cm), Small (20.6 x 11.9 x 8.4 cm), Old Medium (24.9 x 15 x 8.9 cm), New Medium (28 x 18 x 9 cm), Large (27.7 x 17.3 x 7.4 cm) and the discontinued XL (38.1 x 29.2 x 9.5 cm). Chanel's own product pages only use three width words, and the Boy called New Medium is 3 mm wider than the one Chanel calls Large.

The Chanel Boy is sold under six tier names — Mini, Small, Old Medium, New Medium, Large and the discontinued Extra Large — and a closed-base width anywhere from 15 cm to 38.1 cm is the only reliable way to tell them apart, because Chanel’s own product pages label just three of the six and the resale-market words are not official. The name buyers use most, New Medium, is the widest body in the current line.

None of the tier words maps cleanly onto a measurement, so shop by the closed-base width: Mini 15 cm, Small 20.6 cm, Old Medium 24.9 cm, New Medium 28 cm, Large 27.7 cm, and the discontinued Extra Large 38.1 cm. The top of that range is where the sequence breaks, because the body Chanel sells as New Medium measures 28 cm across — roughly 3 mm wider than the 27.7 cm body it sells as Large. Depth reverses that ranking: the Large is 7.4 cm deep against the New Medium’s 9 cm, so the narrower-named bag is the shallower one. Chanel’s archived product pages also print the dimension line height-first, so a listing marked simply Medium can be the 24.9 cm body or the 28 cm body, and the number alone will not tell you which.

The Boy arrived in 2011 as Karl Lagerfeld’s squared-off answer to the Classic Flap, named after Arthur “Boy” Capel. It remains the easiest Chanel shape to spot across a room and one of the hardest to size from a listing, because the tier words the resale market uses do not match the words on Chanel’s own product pages — and the official pages print the dimension line in an order most people read backwards.

Everything below comes from measurements we pulled from primary pages: Chanel’s own product listings for the Small, Medium and Large Boy, read through archive snapshots because the live site returns a block to automated requests, cross-checked against PurseBlog, FASHIONPHILE item measurements, Rebag, SACLÀB, Editorialist, Coco Approved Studio, Luxbags and Bragmybag. Where those sources disagree, we say so rather than average them.

Six tier names, three of them on Chanel’s own site

Open Chanel’s site today and you will find the Boy under three product names only: Small BOY CHANEL Handbag at 8.1 in across, an unlabelled BOY CHANEL Handbag at 9.8 in, and Large BOY CHANEL Handbag at 10.9 in. There is no “Medium” on the label of the middle one, and the words “Old Medium” and “New Medium” — the two terms buyers use most — appear nowhere on the official pages.

The resale and collector side of the market filled that gap, and FASHIONPHILE’s own guide sets out the full set of names: Mini, which it describes as a seasonal size, then Small, Medium (also known as Old Medium), New Medium, Large, and Extra Large, which it dates to 2013–2014 only. SACLÀB gives a slightly tighter version of the same idea, calling the range “four regular sizes” — small at 8 in, old medium at 9.8 in, new medium at 11 in and “taller than the old medium”, and large at 11.8 in.

Two naming traps follow from that:

• “Medium” alone is ambiguous. A listing that says Medium without further information could be the 9.8 in body or the 11 in body. Those differ by 3.1 cm in width and 3 cm in height — more than the gap between two named Classic Flap tiers.
• The Mini is not a permanent tier. Chanel added it later as a seasonal size, so the same model name appears in fewer seasons and in smaller numbers than the rest. Treat a Mini-sized listing as something to verify with a measurement rather than assume from the word.

Every Boy tier measured: cm, inches, and both chain drops

This is the full set of published figures we could source for each tier. Both numbers for the chain are real, and the reason is in the next section: the Boy chain is long enough to be carried doubled on the shoulder or single across the body, and the two drop figures describe those two carries.

Product references we saw on the official pages: Small A67085-Y09953-94305, the unlabelled Medium A67086-Y09953-94305, Large A92193-Y09953-94305, all in calfskin with ruthenium-finish metal. Bragmybag lists A67364 for the Mini.

Three points about how to read that table:

1. The centimetre values for the three current tiers are converted, not copied. The archived Chanel pages render only the inch line — “Dimensions 4.7 x 8.1 x 3.3 in cm” for the Small — so the cm figures above are those inch values multiplied by 2.54 and rounded to one decimal. Where a source published centimetres directly, we kept theirs.
2. Width and height published by different sources can differ by up to 9 mm. Chanel prints 8.1 in for the Small while PurseBlog prints 7.9 in and Luxbags 20.5 cm, and FASHIONPHILE’s own item measurements for a Small Boy read 7.75 in across. For the Large, Chanel prints 10.9 in where PurseBlog, Editorialist and Coco Approved Studio all reach 11.75–11.8 in. We list the official figure as the tier value and leave the others visible rather than splitting the difference.
3. The XL row is thinner than the rest. Only FASHIONPHILE’s guide carries its measurements, and no source we could read publishes a drop figure for it. Treat the XL numbers as a single-source set and measure anything you are offered in that size.

Why the New Medium is wider than the Boy called Large

Rank the Boy tiers by width alone and the sequence breaks: the New Medium at 28 cm across is 3 mm wider than the body Chanel currently sells as the Large Boy at 27.7 cm. Two things explain it rather than contradict it.

First, the names were never a single ladder. The New Medium came in when Chanel enlarged the original Medium in 2014 — Editorialist records the change as nearly a two-inch increase in width plus two extra interior pockets — so it sits in the line as the successor to the 9.8 in body, not as a step below the Large. The Large Boy is a separate, shallower shape: 27.7 cm wide but only 7.4 cm deep and 17.3 cm tall, against the New Medium’s 9 cm and 18 cm.

Second, depth is what actually separates them in use. The Large gives up 1.6 cm of depth to the New Medium while staying the same width, which is the difference between carrying a full-size wallet flat and not. If you rank these two by the size word alone, you will pick the shallower bag believing it is the bigger one.

Reading Chanel’s own dimension line: the order is height first

Chanel’s product pages print three numbers with no axis labels: the Small Boy reads 4.7 x 8.1 x 3.3 in, the Medium Boy reads 5.9 x 9.8 x 3.5 in, and the Large Boy reads 6.8 x 10.9 x 2.9 in. None of those first numbers is the width. Chanel’s wider Classic Flap lines confirm the order: the Small Classic prints 5.7 x 9 x 2.3 in, the Medium Classic 11.12 prints 6 x 9.9 x 2.5 in, and the Large Classic prints 7.7 x 11.8 x 3.9 in — in every case the first number is height, the second is width and the third is depth.

This matters more for the Boy than for any other Chanel shape, because buyers cross-reference the official line against resale measurements that are written width-first. If you assume the first official number is width, an 8.1 in Small Boy looks narrower than the 9.8 in body by a wider margin than it is, and the Medium Boy at 15 cm first looks like a Mini. When a listing quotes “9.8” without a label, ask which axis that is.

What each Boy tier carries, from a phone-only Mini to the 2014 Extra Large

Rebag describes the Mini as able to fit “keys, wallet, and phone” and calls the Small “a little bit larger — but just as cute”; Editorialist notes that the Extra Large could swallow foldable flats. Working from the published interiors and depths, the practical picture is:

The depth column does most of the work here. The Small is the only tier whose depth (8.4 cm) is proportionally large against its width, which is why it holds more than its 20.6 cm suggests; the Large is the reverse, since 7.4 cm of depth across a 27.7 cm body means wide but thin. FASHIONPHILE describes the interiors consistently across tiers — a fabric lining with a patch pocket on the Small, and zipper plus patch pockets on the New Medium — so the difference between tiers is volume, not compartment count.

The square CC press lock, the leather panel chain and the shoulder pad

The Boy closes with a squared CC press lock, not the Classic Flap’s flat turn-lock. SACLÀB calls it “the large square CC squeeze-lock clasp”, and FASHIONPHILE’s item descriptions label it a “squared aged gold Chanel CC press lock” or “Chanel Boy CC push lock” depending on the metal. It is a mechanical press rather than a magnetic snap, so it takes a firm push and gives an audible click when seated.

The chain is the other half of the design and the reason the table above carries two drop figures. SACLÀB describes it as “a satisfyingly chunky metal chain punctuated with a leather panel” that “can be worn doubled up as a shoulder strap or alternatively as a long cross-body strap”; FASHIONPHILE’s listings add “a leather shoulder pad”. So the short drop in our table — 29.2 to 30.5 cm — is the doubled chain, and the long drop — 45.7 to 55.9 cm — is the same chain worn single. Roughly 30 cm is a shoulder length on most frames, and anything from 45 cm upward clears a winter coat for cross-body wear.

One practical consequence: the New Medium has the shortest single-chain drop in the range at 45.7 cm, so on a taller frame it sits higher across the body than the smaller Small Boy does at 53.3 cm. Chain length does not scale with the size word.

Ruthenium, antique gold, So Black: hardware codes and what they change

The three Boy tiers on Chanel’s site today are all listed as calfskin with ruthenium-finish metal, and the Large also appears in a grained calfskin with gold-tone metal. FASHIONPHILE’s guide widens that: it lists “diverse hardware options like Ruthenium, So Black, and Plexiglass”, and SACLÀB notes that in recent years black leather with either ruthenium or antique gold has become a fixture rather than a one-season idea.

What the hardware name changes is the read of the bag, not its size. A ruthenium-finish lock sits close to black leather in tone and disappears in photos; an aged or antique gold lock is the version that shows up as a distinct square on the flap; So Black makes lock, chain and grommets match the leather so the closure all but vanishes. If you are comparing two listings of the same tier and one looks smaller, check the hardware tone before the measurements — a lock that reads clearly makes the whole body look wider.

Boy widths against the Classic Flap at the same tier word

Chanel buyers are usually deciding between these two lines at the same time, and the comparison is more even than the usual summary suggests. Official width figures, converted at 2.54 cm to the inch:

The pattern is not uniform. At the Small end the Classic Flap is meaningfully wider; at Old Medium against the Medium Classic the two bodies are within two millimetres of each other. So the common line that the Boy runs narrower at every tier is true at the small end and effectively untrue at the medium one — what separates the two at that tier is depth and structure, not width. Our Chanel Classic Flap size guide lists the same three Classic tiers as 23 cm, 25.5 cm and 30 cm; the differences from the conversions above are rounding plus a few millimetres of spread between published measurement sets, and they do not change the comparison.

The Boy’s depth is also greater at the same tier in the small sizes — 8.4 cm against 5.8 cm for the Small Classic — while the Large Classic reverses that at 9.9 cm against 7.4 cm. Width parity with a depth advantage in different places is why the two bags hold different things despite reading similarly on a shelf.

If the Boy has already been ruled out and the choice is inside the Classic Flap ladder, the two steps that decide it are written out on their own pages: the Small against the Medium and the Medium against the Jumbo. Both use the 23, 25.5 and 30 cm widths quoted above, so the numbers cannot drift between the three pages.

Calfskin, caviar, lambskin, velvet: the materials that change the surface, not the measurements

Calfskin and lambskin dominate the Boy line. SACLÀB states plainly that “the most common leathers for the Boy Bag are calfskin and lambskin” while noting the house has released enough variations that materials vary widely; FASHIONPHILE’s item pages show caviar quilted and lambskin quilted Boy flaps side by side, and its guide adds textiles including Galuchat and Velvet. Chanel’s own archived listings also cover Mini and Small Boy messenger versions in velvet.

Nothing in those materials changes the published measurements — a caviar Small and a lambskin Small are the same 20.6 x 11.9 x 8.4 cm. What material changes is how the bag ages and how it photographs: caviar’s grain stands up to handling and holds the diamond quilting crisp, lambskin is smoother and marks more, velvet and Galuchat are seasonal surfaces that read as texture in a photo rather than shape. The item pages we cross-checked describe the same interior across materials, a fabric lining with a patch pocket on the Small and zipper plus patch pockets on the New Medium.

Four tape measurements worth taking, and the two photos to send

If the bag is in front of you, or a seller is willing to take photos, these are the four numbers that separate one Boy tier from the next, in the order they are worth asking for:

1. Closed width across the base. This is the tier number: 15, 20.6, 24.9, 27.7, 28 or 38.1 cm. Measure the base rather than the widest point of the flap, because the flap flares past the body.
2. Height at the centre of the flap, flap closed. 10, 11.9, 15, 17.3, 18 or 29.2 cm. This is the axis that separates Old Medium from New Medium most clearly.
3. Depth at the base. 6 to 9.5 cm across the range; the 1.6 cm gap between the New Medium and the Large lives here.
4. Chain drop, measured twice. Once with the chain doubled and once laid out single. If the doubled figure lands near 30 cm and the single near 46–56 cm, the chain is the standard Boy length rather than a shortened or extended one.

Two photos are enough to support those: one with a tape or ruler laid across the closed base, and one with the chain stretched out along the floor beside a tape. Ask the seller to keep the lock visible in the first shot, since the square press lock is what distinguishes the Boy from the Classic Flap in a thumbnail. The reference code is the fastest confirmation of all — A67085, A67086 and A92193 are on the official pages for the Small, Medium and Large, and our Chanel Classic Flap model reference shows how the same codes appear next to the diamond quilting and interwoven chain.

Old Medium or New Medium: how a listing usually names them

Because the resale market invented the two Medium words, sourcing is inconsistent in one specific way: Rebag’s guide calls the 9.8 in / 24.9 cm body the “New Medium” and describes it as “slightly larger than the original Medium”, while PurseBlog, Editorialist, Coco Approved Studio and SACLÀB all apply New Medium to the 11 in / 28 cm body and call 9.8 in the Old Medium. Both conventions are in circulation, so a listing can be accurate and still look wrong against a chart.

The last two rows are exactly the situation the width-versus-depth ranking describes: two bodies described as Large with the same name, several centimetres apart in width and 1.5 cm apart in depth. In practice it is easier to sort them by depth than by width, because the official 10.9 in body is the shallow one.

All of this is easier over a WhatsApp message than a spreadsheet. Send the reference code or a screenshot with the width you measured on WhatsApp, and we will photograph the same tier against a tape and confirm the leather, hardware finish and chain length before you commit. Browse the Chanel bag gallery for current photos, or open the Bags Catalog to see every brand album. For sizing the other Chanel line, the Classic Flap size guide carries the full tier chart.

The six Boy tiers above sit beside the Classic Flap ladder in the Luxury Bag Size Index, each row naming the guide it came from and the date it was checked.