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Fit can often be overlooked. After all, few people will ever see you in your underwear. Even then, it matters a lot. “The fit is key to ensuring comfort and confidence,” says Andreas Palm, CEO of CDLP. Comfort is the obvious reason to focus on fit, but confidence is that secret sauce that can turn a plain pair of boxer briefs into the reason you feel like a Hollywood heartthrob.
There’s another secret ingredient, too. “Beyond that, underwear should match your personal style, make you feel sexy, and be crafted from high-quality, responsibly sourced materials,” Palm says. “It’s a category that’s often overlooked, but when done right, the difference is undeniable.”
How We Tested These Products
Personal style, as we’re wont to remind you, is just that: personal. Nowhere is that more true than your underwear, the first piece of clothing you put on in the morning, and the last piece you (or a lucky someone) removes at the end of the day. The right underwear for Jack isn’t the right underwear for Joe—especially if Jack swears by all-cotton boxer shorts, and Joe prefers silky, thigh-hugging trunks.
So with that in mind, we designed our months-long underwear-testing process to encompass as many preferences, body types, and lifestyles as possible. In doing so, we enlisted a who’s who of GQ staffers—including key members of our Recommends team—to subject the underwear in question to the rigors of daily life; we shimmied into them before work, squatted in them at the gym, and generally wore ‘em to pieces day in and day out until our laundry machines cried uncle.
And then, finally, we got our crack (heh) team of testers together in a room and asked them to assign each pair a score, evaluating its comfort, breathability, fit, quality, support, value—and, perhaps most importantly, overall style. Based on those evaluations, we ran the numbers, collated the anecdotal evidence, and emerged with a list of what we believe to be the absolute best underwear for men right now, from the tried-and-true stalwarts to the modern disruptors, the cheap multipacks to the wildly expensive (but wildly worth-it) solo buys. Whatever your preferences, whatever your lifestyle, there’s bound to be a superlative pair of skivvies on this list for you. (Read more about GQ’s testing process here.)
Best Underwear FAQ
What’s the difference between boxers and boxer briefs?
The main difference between boxers and boxer briefs is fit. Boxers typically provide a relaxed fit with more coverage, while boxer briefs are form-fitting and offer more support. Which is best for you comes down to personal preference.
What material is best for underwear?
The fabric should be stretchy enough to curve to your body without restricting your range of motion (high kicks all day, baby!) and keep its shape all day long. That fabric should also be breathable and soft and should also last a long time without pilling. To achieve those main objectives, manufacturers use a variety of different fabrics. While materials like lyocell, rayon, and micromodal fabric provide an insanely smooth feel, the supreme all-natural breathability of a pair of Supima cotton boxer briefs also makes for a great pair of undies. More often than not, the best underwear uses a balanced blend of materials, usually with some amount of elastane for stretch and recovery.
How many pairs of underwear should I own?
This one depends on how often you do laundry: In general, you always want to have at least a week’s worth of clean pairs left, even on laundry day. If you do laundry every week, you should own at least two week’s worth of undies. (And if you go to the gym a lot, factor those extra pairs in, too.) Finally, it’s always good to have a couple of nicer pairs at the ready too, for partner time and other special occasions. Factoring all of that in: 15-20 pairs is the sweet spot for most guys, rising to 25 or 30 pairs for extremely active folks.
How often should I buy new underwear?
You’ll know it when you see (or feel) it. The first sign of trouble is normally a hole in the fabric—which, trust us, will only get bigger—or feeling that the elastic waistband has become too loose to be comfortable. But sometimes, stains appear much earlier than this, and we’d encourage you to be vigilant about those. A good rule: If you wouldn’t want someone else seeing the pair, you probably shouldn’t be either.
Are boxer briefs bad for sperm count?
You’ve probably heard about the hubbub surrounding male fertility and underwear. Researchers at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health have observed lower sperm counts on average across those who wear tighter underwear (a.k.a. boxer briefs, trunks, briefs, etc.) versus those who wear loose-fitting underwear (boxer shorts). Naturally, your testicles function better at a lower temp than the rest of your body, which is why they hang away from you. Tighter underwear tends to lift the testicles closer to the body, causing them to be warmer than normal thereby slowing sperm production. All that sad, it’s important to keep in mind that that doesn’t necessarily impact fertility.
Production Credits
Photographs by Bowen Fernie
Styled by Tyler Austin
Read the full article here
