Just getting into kitesurfing? We've got you covered. From kites to harnesses, you'll find everything you need to make the right choices as a beginner. Ready to put together your first kite setup? Contact us for personal advice.
Wetsuits for beginners
Buying a wetsuit. We help you as a beginner in making the right wetsuit choice.
It is important to stay warm if you are in the water for a few hours to enjoy a great session. So it is crucial you buy a good wetsuit to keep you warm. On this page we tell you all there is to know about wetsuits:
Wetsuit for summer or winter! Back-zip or front-zip? With hood or without? From 1mm neoprene to a 6/5mm winter wetsuit with integrated hood, there are many options to choose from.
Shorty
Shortys have long or short arms and short legs.
Shortys are for summer months or warmer temperatures.
Full suit
Full suit wetsuits have long arms and long legs and are most common types of wetsuits.
Hooded suit
Full suit with integrated hood: These wetsuits are for winter.
Thermo layers
There are different types of thermo layers that can be worn separately, under or over a wetsuit.
Neoprene Accessories
These are crucial to extend your season. Add boots first, as your feet are always in the cold water followed by adding thermo layers with a hood and lastly gloves.
A wetsuit that is indicated as a 4/3 has 4mm of neoprene at the upper body and 3mm at the extremities. The material is thinner at your elbows and legs to offer you more freedom of movement.
The thickness of a wetsuit is the major factor that determines how warm a wetsuit is. See our Kitemana Wetsuit Guide chart below for recommended thicknesses and neoprene accessories – the colder the water, the thicker the material!
This table just serves as an orientation and the ideal thicknesses might vary 1-2mm from the recommendation above due to wind chillfs-bigger , yhalfactivity level, length of your sessions and individual sensitivity.
Backzip wetsuits
Backzip wetsuits are the easiest and fastest to get in and out. However, backzip wetsuits tend to let the most water in and are not as flexible as the other two. If you prefer comfort over performance, backzip wetsuits are for you.
Frontzip wetsuits
Frontzip wetsuits have shorter zippers, which are located on the chest. Therefore, these wetsuits are a bit more hassle to put on but allow less water to come in and offer more freedom of movement. If you do not mind a bit more effort, before and after the session, go for a frontzip wetsuit.
No-zip wetsuits
No-zip wetsuits are top notch performance products and designed for wave and freestyle kiters that seek maximum performance. We recommend No-zip wetsuits as the best mix of comfort and performance.
Wetsuits come in regular US sizes like M (medium). However, where normal clothing is looser and therefore has a wider fit, a wetsuit should really fit like a glove. For this reason additional length measures have been developed like MT or MS (medium tall or medium short). You will find size charts to each wetsuit on the product pages in our online shop.
Slip in feet first and work yourself forward bit by bit. When sliding in with your feet, to not pull at the chest, but at the legs. Do not pull too hard and be careful with your fingernails and the smooth mesh neoprene on the front and back. You can check out our blog post on how to put on wetsuits properly with video instructions here:
Rinse it with cold, fresh water after each session.
Do not dry your wetsuit in direct sun light.
Dry your wetsuit inside out.
Store it nicely on a wide hanger. Preferable with arms and legs down.
We like to give you the best experience and most relevant deals on our website, media and through our advertisements. To do that, we need to place cookies and collect some data. If you are ok with this, press the green accept button! For more information click here or change settings to your preference.
Functional
Always active
Cookies that are necessary for a proper functioning website. These cookies are necessary for you to be able to login, make a purchase and similar.
Analytics cookies
To give us insight into the functioning of our website and how we can improve this, so we can give you a better experience on our website. We need to place analytics cookies and collect analytics data.
Advertising cookies
We want to give you the most relevant communication on our website and across other digital media and advertising. To allow us to optimise our advertising and similar off site communications we need to place advertising cookies and collect promotional data.
User data sharing
To be able to measure our advertising performance we need insight into what works and what works less well. To give you the best advertising experience, we share user data with our main advertising platforms like Google and Meta.
Personalization cookies
To give you a personalised experience in our advertising, based on you website visit for instance, we place cookies and collect information on collective website visits and engagement. That way we can personalise our advertising on your interests.