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According to decorator Carrie Carrollo, a good shower curtain is the easiest, cheapest, and most impactful way to make a boring rental bathroom more appealing. There are tons of options beyond vinyl sheets printed with novelty patterns (although if that’s what you want, we’ve got you) — from simple, ultradurable PEVA to hand-sewn canvas inspired by Joself Albers’s color studies. I consulted several experts and brought my own expertise as a textiles and materials nerd to find the best shower curtains for every kind of space. I also tested our best-in-class curtain in my own home.
What we’re looking for
Material
Shower curtains can be divided into two main categories: those made from impermeable, waterproof materials, and fabric curtains that can absorb water and therefore need to be paired with a waterproof liner to keep them from getting soggy every time you take a shower. In the first category, the most common materials are PEVA or EVA (polyethylene vinyl acetate and ethylene vinyl acetate), types of vinyl. These materials have begun to replace PVC, a previously popular shower-curtain material, because they’re made without chlorine, an ingredient in PVC that is associated with pollution and adverse health effects. (PVC is also the culprit behind that horrible new-shower-curtain smell, which results from the material off-gassing; a PEVA or EVA curtain doesn’t have the same chemical scent.)
Fabric curtains are made from a range of materials, such as cotton percale, canvas, polyester, and linen, that are lightweight enough to hang from your curtain rod and aren’t unwieldy to open and shut. They’ll need to occasionally be taken off their hooks and put through the wash to keep mold and grime in check, but are usually nicer-looking than synthetic curtains — they can make a bathroom feel cozier or more luxe — and, under the right circumstances, can last for longer.
Size
The standard size for a shower curtain is 72 inches by 72 inches, which gives you about a foot of clearance compared to the width of an average-size bathtub. Some curtain styles on this list include extra-tall options, in case your rod is mounted high, and curtains designed for stall showers, which are 36 inches wide.
Best shower curtain overall
Material: 12-gauge EVA | Size: 72 inches wide by 72 or 84 inches long
Quiet Town’s Sun Shower is the rare vinyl shower curtain that looks good enough to use on its own, making it a great fits-everyone option, from those with tiny showers trying to avoid the visual weight of a fabric curtain to people with large, sunny bathrooms who want to take advantage of natural light. It comes in 12 solid colors — from neutral clear and amber to Barbie pink and neon lime green — and several patterns, so it can suit any décor style. Strategist senior editor Crystal Martin owns it in bright orange and says that “looking out through this transparent curtain feels like wearing OJ-colored glasses,” she says. “It’s a small morning treat that I’ve come to love.”
I’ve been using the amber colorway (above) for over a year and absolutely love it — It’s odd to say about a shower curtain, but it’s kind of sexy. The color reads as a neutral, like mahogany or tortoiseshell, and adds texture and depth to the room without making it feel smaller. Its transparency makes the room seem bigger than a matte curtain would, and during the daytime, light filters through it, coloring the walls warm and reddish. Laura Fenton, the author of The Little Book of Living Small, agrees: “For years, I used clear plastic shower liners as my ‘shower curtain’ because they made my small bathrooms look bigger,” she says, but the problem was that they “always looked like cheap shower liners.” She describes the Sun Shower curtain as “a fancy version of my budget solution”: the same transparency with thicker 12-gauge vinyl and a higher-quality material.
Best less-expensive shower curtain
Material: PEVA | Size: Five sizes, including extra-long and stall
This popular shower curtain is made from a PEVA material that has no plasticky smell. It comes in clear, frosted, and white vinyl in two different thicknesses, five sizes (including an extra-long option and a narrower width for shower stalls), and six different soothing colors, like sage green and charcoal.
Best fabric shower curtains
Best waffle shower curtain
Material: Organic cotton | Size: 72 inches by 72 inches (pre-shrunk)
“I can’t resist anything waffle weave,” says Carrollo, “and I love this one.” It’s made of plush organic cotton and comes preshrunk, so you don’t have to worry about an awkward fit after the first wash cycle. She thinks it would be great to “balance out a bathroom with a more bold design on the walls or floor.”
Best less-expensive waffle shower curtain
Material: 60% cotton, 40% polyester | Size: 72 inches by 72 inches
For a less-expensive waffle-weave curtain, Strategist food and dining writer Emma Wartzman likes this option from Target’s in-house brand Threshold, a favorite brand across the Strategist for home linens. “The white keeps my small bathroom looking clean and bright, but the waffle weave gives it just a bit of visual texture,” she says.
Best linen shower curtain
Material: European linen | Size: 72 inches by 72 inches
For a minimalist shower curtain with a nice drape, try Parachute’s 100 percent European flax panel, which comes in three colors — white, off-white, and charcoal. (The brand also makes some of our favorite linen window curtains.) It’s a favorite of Strategist home editor Simone Kitchens, who says it works in any space, including her former pink-tiled 1950s bathroom in Los Angeles.
Best colorblocked shower curtain
Material: Cotton canvas | Size: 72 inches by 72 inches
Quiet Town’s hand-sewn canvas shower curtains have landed on multiple Strategist holiday gift guides for their solid construction, durability, and unexpected, stylish designs, such as the curtain above with a small circular portholelike window (the brand recommends pairing it with a liner to avoid spray escaping the hole). It’s a splurge, but Strategist writer Dominique Pariso attests it’s worth it. She’s had hers for over four years and “it looks brand-new,” she says. “I really can’t overstate how well it’s held up; it looks exactly the same as the day I got it.” The heavyweight cotton canvas material is “completely opaque, which I dig. It makes the shower feel cozy,” she says.
Best gingham shower curtain
Material: Cotton percale | Size: 72 inches by 72 inches
In a search for “a gingham shower curtain that doesn’t look awful,” Martin found this cotton-percale option from Schoolhouse. (She price-watched it to buy on sale.) “It was worth it,” she reports. It’s made of a percale cotton with a small gingham check in a rusty brown shade or a deep evergreen. “It’s a really nice, soft cotton, and the check is the exact right size,” she says.
Best synthetic shower curtains and liners
Best fabric shower-curtain liner
Material: Polyester | Size: 71 inches by 71 inches
For an opaque, matte shower curtain, I recommend this inexpensive model from Target. Two Strategist staffers own it — senior editor Jen Trolio and associate editor Jenna Milliner-Waddell — and report that it holds up well as a liner for a decorative curtain. (This is a good setup if you’re trying to avoid vinyl curtains entirely.) Trolio reports that it hasn’t had problems with mold and doesn’t need to be washed more than once every few months.
Best hookless shower curtain
Material: PEVA | Size: 71 inches wide by 74 inches long
If you’ve procrastinated buying shower hooks, this curtain has the same specs we’re looking for in other waterproof curtains — PEVA fabric and standard dimensions — and has flexible grommets that can be mounted directly to a rod without the need for hanging hardware.
Best novelty shower curtain
Material: PEVA | Size: 70 inches wide by 72 inches long
If you’re looking for a more interactive PEVA curtain liner, this one has a map of the world (national capitals and major cities included) to study for the geography trivia questions while in the shower.
Best stall-size shower curtain
Material: Polyester | Size: 36 inches wide by 72 inches long
Not everyone needs a bathtub-width shower curtain; some require only a shower-width one. This version is made of durable, washable polyester and comes in 15 colors.
Some more bathroom decor we’ve written about
Our experts
• Carrie Carrollo, home decorator
• Laura Fenton, author of The Little Book of Living Small
• Dominique Pariso, Strategist writer
• Crystal Martin, Strategist senior editor
• Jenna Milliner-Waddell, Strategist associate editor
• Jen Trolio, Strategist senior editor
• Emma Wartzman, Strategist food and dining writer
Additional reporting by Stacey Woods
Update on June 28, 2024: Added the Parachute linen shower curtain, which was previously out of stock; updated prices and checked stock for all other products.
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