Amigurumi Sphere Schedule: Every Round Counted for You

A crocheted ball is three sections stacked on top of each other: increases outward from the magic ring, a straight-sided middle, and decreases that mirror the increases back to a closable hole. This calculator takes the stitches in your magic ring, the number of increase rounds you want, and how many even rounds sit at the widest point, then prints the whole schedule round by round with the stitch count for each one.

The pattern beneath it is old and simple. Round 1 is your magic ring. Round 2 doubles it. Round 3 triples it. Every increase round adds exactly one full magic-ring’s worth of stitches, so a 6-stitch ring grows 6, 12, 18, 24 and keeps going in sixes. The decreases run the same ladder backwards.

What the calculator does is remove the arithmetic and the miscounting. It also shows you the shape of the thing before you make it: a ball with two even rounds is a different animal from one with ten, and you can see both in the table before winding a single stitch.

✂️ How to use the Amigurumi Sphere Schedule

Three fields, and the first one sets the entire geometry. Starting stitches (magic ring) is the count you work into the ring on round 1, default 6. Six is the standard for most amigurumi and gives a round, tight sphere. Eight gives a slightly flatter, wider ball at the same round count. Twelve is used for large heads and pumpkins where you want size without a hundred rounds.

Increase rounds is how many times you add a full ring’s worth of stitches, default 6. This single number decides how wide the ball gets, because the widest round is simply the starting stitches multiplied by the increase rounds. Six increase rounds on a 6-stitch ring gives 36 stitches at the equator.

Increase rounds control the diameter and nothing else. If your ball is coming out too small, this is the field to raise, and every extra round adds one more magic ring’s worth of stitches to the widest point.

Even rounds at widest is how many rounds you work straight, with no shaping, at the equator. Default 4. Set this to 0 and you get a true sphere that starts decreasing the moment it stops increasing. Set it to 8 or 10 and you have a barrel, a tin can, or the body of a very long cat.

The table on the right redraws as you type. It lists every round from the magic ring to the last decrease, labels each one Increase, Even or Decrease, and gives the stitch count at the end of that round. The Widest round tile above it is the headline: your equator count, printed large.

Read the table from the top, work the round, tick it off. That is the entire workflow. There is nothing to submit and no output beyond what you can see.

📋 Calculator fields explained

Starting stitches (magic ring) – how many single crochet stitches you work into the magic ring on round 1, in whole steps, default 6. This value becomes the increment for every increase round and the decrement for every decrease round. Six is standard, 8 gives a slightly flatter ball, and 12 suits large shapes.

Increase rounds – how many rounds of shaping you work outward from the ring, in whole steps, default 6. The widest round is this number multiplied by the starting stitches. More increase rounds means a bigger ball, not a differently shaped one.

Even rounds at widest – how many rounds you work without any shaping at the equator, in whole steps, default 4. Zero gives a sphere. Larger numbers stretch the middle into a cylinder while keeping both caps identical.

📊 Understanding the results

The widest round is the number that predicts the finished size. With the defaults it reads 36 sts, which is the equator of almost every standard amigurumi head and body you have ever seen. That is 6 stitches multiplied by 6 increase rounds, and it is the reason so many patterns look alike.

The widest round is always starting stitches multiplied by increase rounds, which means you can hit 48 stitches with a 6-stitch ring and 8 increase rounds, or with an 8-stitch ring and 6 increase rounds. Those two balls are the same width and different shapes, because the first has a rounder cap and the second flattens out sooner.

The table is a stitch-count checklist, and that is its real job. If you finish round 4 and count 25 rather than 24, you added an extra increase and the ball will start puckering by round 6. Counting against the table on every round costs ten seconds and saves an hour of frogging.

The first round labelled Decrease prints the same count as the widest round. That is how the schedule is built: it marks the start of the decrease section, and the first genuine reduction lands on the round after it. Do not decrease on that row.

The Even rows are all identical, which is intentional. Four rows of 36 sts means four rounds of plain single crochet with nothing to think about, and it is the section where you check the shape against your hand and decide whether the middle is long enough before you commit to closing.

Lisa Mandel

Total round count is what the table gives you at a glance. Six increases plus four even plus the decrease section produces 16 rows with the defaults, so a 36-stitch ball is roughly 16 rounds of work: an evening.

Watch the extremes. A 6-stitch ring with 12 increase rounds gives a 72-stitch equator and a very large ball. Set the increase rounds to 2 and you have a 12-stitch widest round, which is barely a bead and closes in six rows total.

🧮 Calculation formulas

Three lines, and the whole schedule falls out of them. Let s be the starting stitches, n the increase rounds, and e the even rounds.

stitches at increase round i = s x i
widest round = s x n
every even round = s x n
decrease section counts down: s x n, s x (n-1), ... s x 1

The increase ladder is pure multiplication. Round 1 has s stitches. Round 2 has 2s. Round i has i multiplied by s, because each increase round adds exactly one more s. That is why the classic 6-12-18-24-30-36 sequence exists and why every amigurumi pattern in print uses it.

Walking the defaults: s = 6, n = 6, e = 4. Round 1 is 6. Round 2 is 12. Round 3 is 18. Round 4 is 24. Round 5 is 30. Round 6 is 36, which is the widest. Rounds 7 through 10 are all 36. Then the decrease section prints 36, 30, 24, 18, 12, 6 across rounds 11 to 16, and you close the remaining hole with a yarn needle.

Each increase round has exactly s increases in it, spread evenly. On round 4 of a 6-stitch ring, you are adding 6 increases across 24 stitches, which is one increase every fourth stitch: the “3 sc, inc” repeat that every pattern writes out.

The stitch instruction for each round follows straight from the count, and it is the same table every crocheter eventually memorises:

The decreases mirror this exactly, so the round that takes you from 36 to 30 is worked as (4 sc, dec) six times, and the round from 12 to 6 is dec in each pair.

Predicting the actual size takes one more step, and the calculator does not do it for you: divide the widest round by pi to get the diameter in stitches, then apply your gauge. At a common amigurumi gauge of 4 stitches per centimetre in worsted yarn with a 3 mm hook, the numbers land like this:

🎨 Practical examples

1. Standard amigurumi head. 6 starting stitches, 6 increase rounds, 4 even rounds. Widest 36 sts. Sixteen rounds total, roughly a 2.9 cm diameter ball in worsted at 4 sts/cm, and the shape most patterns call a head. Stuff at round 13, before the hole gets too small to work through.

2. Tiny keyring ball. 6 starting stitches, 3 increase rounds, 1 even round. Widest 18 sts. The table runs to 7 rounds and the whole ball takes fifteen minutes. Round 1 is 6, rounds 2 and 3 are 12 and 18, round 4 holds at 18, then the decrease section prints 18, 12, 6.

3. Barrel body for a cat. 6 starting stitches, 6 increase rounds, 10 even rounds. Widest 36 sts, and the table now runs to 22 rounds. Ten even rounds at 36 gives a body long enough to sit upright, and the caps at each end stay identical, which is what makes it look deliberate rather than lopsided.

4. Wide flat pumpkin. 12 starting stitches, 4 increase rounds, 2 even rounds. Widest 48 sts. Because the ring starts at 12, the ball reaches 48 in only four rounds and the cap flattens noticeably. That flatness is the whole point of a pumpkin.

The magic ring size does more work than any other number in amigurumi. Six gives you a sphere. Twelve gives you a disc that happens to have depth.

5. Large ball for a soft toy. 6 starting stitches, 10 increase rounds, 6 even rounds. Widest 60 sts. The table runs to 26 rounds, and at 4 sts/cm that is roughly a 4.8 cm diameter, which needs proper stuffing in stages rather than one handful at the end.

6. True sphere, no cylinder. 6 starting stitches, 6 increase rounds, 0 even rounds. Widest 36 sts. The table jumps straight from the last increase into the decrease section, and the result is as close to a real sphere as single crochet gets. Useful for beads, eyes and snowman parts.

7. Batch of 12 stress balls for a market. 6 starting stitches, 8 increase rounds, 6 even rounds. Widest 48 sts. Each ball is 8 + 6 + 8 = 22 rounds. Twelve balls is 264 rounds and roughly 8,600 stitches, which is a genuine two-evening job and worth knowing before you promise a delivery date.

8. Yarn substitution edge case. Your pattern gives 36 sts widest in worsted, and you are working the same schedule in DK. The stitch counts do not change at all, but the finished ball comes out roughly 20 percent smaller. Bump the increase rounds from 6 to 7, widest becomes 42, and the ball lands close to the original size.

9. Matching two body parts. A snowman needs a 48-stitch base and a 36-stitch head. Run the calculator twice: 6 sts and 8 increase rounds with 3 even for the base, then 6 sts and 6 increase rounds with 2 even for the head. The two tables together are your whole pattern, and both close the same way.

10. Egg shape by asymmetry. The calculator mirrors the caps by design, so a true egg is out of reach. The workaround is to run it with 0 even rounds, then add 3 or 4 plain rounds by hand between the last increase and the first decrease of only one end. The table stays your reference for the counts; the asymmetry is yours to add.

💡 Tips and best practices

Use a stitch marker at the start of every round and move it as you go. Amigurumi is worked in a continuous spiral, not joined rounds, and the marker is the only thing standing between you and a lost round.

Stagger the increase positions from round to round. If you always put the increase in the same column, the ball grows six visible ridges and looks like a hexagon. Shifting the repeat by one or two stitches each round hides the shaping and gives a smooth curve.

Count against the table at the end of every increase round, not at the end of the section. An error on round 3 is two minutes to fix. The same error found on round 8 is a whole cap frogged.

Stuff in stages, not at the end. Add filling every three or four decrease rounds and press it into the top of the ball with the blunt end of a hook, so the sphere stays round instead of collapsing into a pouch.

Work tighter than you would for a garment. A 3 mm hook with worsted yarn feels wrong until you see that it stops the stuffing showing through the fabric. Go down at least one hook size from the yarn band recommendation.

Pick the increase round count before the even round count. Increases fix the width, and width is what people look at. The even rounds only change the length, and you can decide that after you have held the piece in your hand.

Keep the first decrease row of the table in mind, since it prints the widest count. Treat that row as your “start decreasing next round” marker and you will not lose a stitch to it.

Close the final hole with the yarn tail and a needle, not with a slip stitch. Weave the tail through the front loops of the last 6 stitches and pull, and the hole disappears completely.

Note the widest round on the pattern you are writing. It is the one number another crocheter needs to reproduce your ball, and it is the only number the calculator prints in large type for exactly that reason.

For repeat production, save the three inputs rather than the finished dimensions. Yarn and hook change between batches, and 6-6-4 regenerates the schedule in a second while “a 2.9 cm ball” tells the next person nothing.

⚠️ Common mistakes to avoid

Decreasing on the round that says 36

The decrease section opens with a row printing the same stitch count as the widest round. Work it as a plain round and start the reductions on the next one, or the ball loses six stitches early and the two caps stop matching.

Decreasing on the first Decrease row and then following the rest of the table produces a ball with an asymmetric bottom and six stitches missing at the close, and no amount of stuffing hides it.

Read the stitch count, not just the label. The number in the Stitches column is always the count you should have at the end of that round.

Stacking the increases

Putting every increase in the same position round after round is the most common shaping error in amigurumi. The ball comes out with flat facets and pointed corners, which looks like a badly inflated football rather than a sphere. Move the repeat one stitch along each round.

Working too loose

A loose fabric shows the stuffing through it, and no amount of care at the close will fix that. Stuffing visible through the fabric is unrecoverable once the ball is sewn shut, so drop a hook size and make a swatch before you start.

Confusing the magic ring size with the hook size

Starting stitches is a stitch count, not a millimetre measurement. Entering 3 because you use a 3 mm hook gives you a 3-stitch magic ring, a widest round of 18 with the default 6 increase rounds, and a ball roughly half the size you wanted.

A magic ring of 3 stitches with 6 increase rounds gives 18 sts at the widest, not 36, and the resulting ball is under half the volume of the one you planned.

Six is the number you want in almost every case. Change it only when you want a flatter shape.

Stuffing at the very end

By the time the ball is down to 12 stitches the opening is a couple of centimetres wide, and pushing a whole ball’s worth of filling through it produces a lumpy interior with a hollow crown. Start stuffing while the hole is still 24 stitches across.

Ignoring the even rounds when matching parts

Two balls with the same widest round can be very different lengths. A head at 36 sts with 2 even rounds and a body at 36 sts with 10 even rounds have identical circumference and completely different silhouettes, and that is exactly what you want as long as it was on purpose.

Assuming the counts change with yarn weight

They do not. A 36-stitch equator is 36 stitches in lace, DK, worsted or chunky. What changes is the physical size, and if you need a specific finished diameter you must change the increase rounds, not the yarn.

🎯 When to use this calculator

Open it when you are designing rather than following. A published pattern already lists these rounds, and typing them into a calculator to see them again wastes your evening. The moment you go off-pattern, the schedule is the first thing you need.

Open it when you are resizing. Making a head 30 percent bigger means raising the increase rounds from 6 to 8, which takes the widest round from 36 to 48, and the whole decrease section moves with it. Doing that on paper is slow and error-prone.

Open it when you are matching parts. A snowman with three balls, a doll with a head and a body, a caterpillar with eight identical segments: all of those need consistent schedules, and running the calculator once per part gives you a pattern you can hand to someone else.

Amigurumi has no gauge police. The only thing that has to be right is the stitch count, and that is the only thing this tool cares about.

Leave it closed for anything that is not a closed round shape. Flat circles, cones, tubes worked from a chain and anything with a nose, an ear or a tail all break the mirror symmetry the schedule assumes, and the table will lie to you about the second half.

🔗 Related calculators

Crochet Increase Decrease

Crochet Yarn Yardage

Crochet Gauge

Hook Yarn Weight

Foundation Chain Length

Crochet Pricing

Yarn Left Estimator

📖 Glossary

Amigurumi – Japanese-origin crochet or knitting of small stuffed figures, worked in tight single crochet so the stuffing does not show.

Magic ring – an adjustable loop worked at the start of a piece, into which the first round of stitches is made and then pulled closed. Also called a magic circle.

Round – one full circuit of the piece. In amigurumi these are worked as a continuous spiral rather than joined.

Increase (inc) – two stitches worked into the same stitch of the previous round, adding one to the count.

Decrease (dec) – two stitches of the previous round worked together as one, removing one from the count. The invisible decrease is the usual amigurumi version.

Why do all the increase rounds add the same number of stitches? Because each round adds exactly one magic-ring’s worth. A 6-stitch ring adds 6 every round, which produces the 6, 12, 18, 24 ladder that every pattern uses.

Even round – a round worked with no shaping, one single crochet in each stitch, keeping the count unchanged.

Widest round – the equator of the piece, where the increases stop. In this calculator it equals the starting stitches multiplied by the increase rounds.

Stitch marker – a clip or scrap of yarn placed in the first stitch of a round so you can find it again in a continuous spiral.

Spiral – working round after round without joining or chaining up, which leaves no visible seam.

Frogging – pulling out stitches to undo work.

Invisible decrease – a decrease worked through the front loops only, which is less bulky than a standard sc2tog and nearly disappears in a tight fabric.

Staggering – shifting the position of the increases or decreases from round to round to avoid visible corners.

Gauge – stitches per centimetre or inch, which converts a stitch count into a physical size.

Closing – finishing the piece by weaving the tail through the last few stitches and pulling the hole shut.

❓ Frequently asked questions

How many stitches should be in my magic ring?

Six is the standard, and it is the default here. It produces a round cap and works for heads, bodies, arms and almost everything else in amigurumi.

Use 8 when you want the cap slightly flatter without changing the round count, and 12 for wide, shallow shapes like pumpkins or discs. A 12-stitch ring with 4 increase rounds reaches 48 sts, the same width a 6-stitch ring needs 8 rounds to reach.

How big will my ball be?

The calculator gives stitch counts, not centimetres, because the answer depends on your yarn and your hook. Divide the widest round by pi to get the diameter in stitches, then divide by your gauge.

At a common amigurumi gauge of 4 stitches per centimetre, a 36-stitch equator gives a diameter of roughly 2.9 cm. The same 36 stitches in chunky yarn at 2 sts/cm gives close to 5.7 cm.

Why does the first Decrease row show the widest count?

That is how the schedule is built. The decrease section counts down from the widest number, so its first row repeats the equator count and the first actual reduction lands on the round after it.

Follow the Stitches column rather than the Type label and you will not go wrong. With the defaults, the counts run 36, 30, 24, 18, 12, 6 across the decrease section, and the first 36 is a plain round.

The stitch count is always the authority. A label tells you which section you are in; the number tells you what you should have in your hands at the end of the round.

What if I want an egg shape rather than a ball?

The calculator mirrors the two caps exactly, so it cannot produce an asymmetric shape on its own. Every decrease round is the twin of an increase round.

The workaround is to set the even rounds to 0, take the resulting sphere schedule, and add 3 or 4 plain rounds by hand after the last increase but worked only into the top portion. The stitch counts in the table remain your reference for everything else.

Do I need even rounds at all?

No. Set the field to 0 and the piece goes straight from the last increase into the decreases, which gives the roundest sphere the pattern can produce.

Even rounds exist to lengthen the middle. Four is a mild elongation and reads as a head. Ten at the same 36-stitch equator gives a distinctly cylindrical body.

How many rounds is a standard amigurumi head?

With the defaults it is 16: six increases, four even, and six rows in the decrease section. That is around 500 single crochet stitches in total.

The count grows fast. Ten increase rounds and six even rounds gives a 26-round ball, which is more than 1,500 stitches and a very different commitment.

Where do I stuff?

Start when the opening is still around 24 stitches wide, which on the default schedule is the round after the first real decrease. Add filling in handfuls as the hole shrinks.

Stuffing entirely at the end gives a lumpy ball with a hollow top, because you cannot get filling into the crown through a 12-stitch hole. Push it in with the blunt end of a hook, not with your fingers.

Does the yarn weight change the stitch counts?

Not at all. A 36-stitch equator is 36 stitches regardless of whether you are working lace or chunky.

What changes is the physical size. If a pattern was written in worsted and you are working in DK, expect the ball to come out roughly 20 percent smaller, and add an increase round to compensate.

Why does my ball have corners?

Because the increases are stacked. If you place every increase in the same column, the ball grows facets along those lines and comes out looking like a polyhedron.

Shift the repeat by one or two stitches each round. On the round from 24 to 30 sts, work (3 sc, inc) six times but start the round with 2 sc instead of 3, and the shaping line spirals rather than stacking.

Can I use this for arms and legs?

Partly. An arm is usually a small cap of increases followed by a long tube with no decreases at all, so you can use the increase section and ignore the rest.

Set the increase rounds to 3 or 4, note the widest round (18 or 24 sts with a 6-stitch ring), then work as many even rounds as the limb needs. The decrease section is only relevant if the limb is closed at both ends.

Can I use half double crochet instead of single crochet?

The counts still work, but the fabric changes. Half double crochet is taller and looser, so the same 36-stitch equator produces a larger ball and shows stuffing more readily.

If you switch stitch types, drop a hook size and expect the row height to be roughly 1.4 times a single crochet row, which makes the ball taller relative to its width and stretches the sphere out of shape.

⚖️ Disclaimer

This calculator provides educational craft-planning information for crocheted spheres. It returns stitch counts and a round-by-round schedule based on the three values you enter, and it assumes a continuous spiral worked in single crochet with mirrored increase and decrease sections.

Finished dimensions depend on your yarn weight, hook size, tension and stuffing density, none of which the calculator knows. A 36-stitch equator can produce a ball anywhere from 2 cm to 6 cm across depending on those factors, so treat the stitch counts as exact and the physical size as an estimate.

The schedule assumes symmetric shaping. Anything with a nose, an ear, a flat base or an asymmetric profile will need adjustments the table cannot model, and the second half of the round list will not describe what you are actually working.

Make one small sample before committing an expensive yarn to a large piece. A 3-round test cap takes ten minutes and tells you more about your gauge and tension than any calculation can.