What Does GSM Mean in Clothing?

GSM stands for Grams per Square Meter.

GSM is a 'Unit of Measure' that is used to measure the weight of the unit area for sheet materials. Like clothing fabrics, papers, metal sheet etc.

To know the fabric quality and understand its behavior when garments are made of fabric, one must have information about fabric GSM. Fabric GSM is one of the important fabric quality parameters. The weight of a garment made of low GSM fabric is lighter compared to a garment made of higher GSM.

Why one need to know fabric GSM? 

There is a number of reasons to know and measure fabric gsm. Some of those are

1. When one buy fabric from mills or knitters, customer needs to specify fabric GSM. Otherwise, fabric manufacturers don't know exactly what fabric to make for the customer. e.g. knits jersey of 120 gsm. 
2. Though gsm is measured for both woven and knits fabrics, for knits fabric knowing the gsm is very essential as knitted fabrics are sold in weight. Where woven fabrics are sold in meters/yards. 
3. To procure fabric for the garment one need to find fabric consumption per garment. In knitted garments, fabric gsm plays a crucial role to determine fabric requirement per garment and whole order. 

Also read: How to Calculate Fabric GSM? and How to Find Fabric GSM without Using GSM Cutter?