Long Tail Cast On for Knitting – How to Knit

In this tutorial, I’m going to show you how to do the long tail cast on for knitting. You can either follow along in my written direction or watch the video tutorial!

The long tail cast on for knitting creates a nice stretchy cast on. It’s a great versatile cast on to use for a multitude of projects and you may find you use it for most of your projects. I know I do.

To do a long tail cast on, what you will need is some yarn and one knitting needle.

Why it’s called a long tail cast on is because you are actually going to be working with quite a bit of the tail of your yarn to help with the cast on.

Long Tail Cast On Steps:

Step 1: Pull out a decent amount of yarn for your tail, the length that you will need will vary depending on the number of stitches in your project (more stitches means longer tail).

Step 2: Next, make a slip knot and place on your knitting needle. Pull it tight. Make it tight enough so that it doesn’t just fall right off the needle, but is able to slide up and down on the needle.

Step 3: Now you will position your hands. First place you thumb and pinkie between the two yarns coming from the slip knot.

Step 4: Next, grab the two yarns with the last three fingers to hold the yarn in place.

Step 5: Take your index finger and pick up the strand of yarn that is not looped around your thumb so that you have a loop of yarn around your thumb and around your index finger.

Step 6: Now, take your knitting needle and go down and around the yarn on the thumb closest to you.

Step 7: Then go up and around the yarn on the outside of your index finger.

Step 8: Take the knitting needle down through the middle of the loop on your thumb.

Step 9: Drop the yarn on the thumb.

Step 10: Take the thumb down and pick up the strand of yarn that was going to the thumb. Make sure to pick it up close to where it comes out of the grasp of the middle finger.

Step 11: Pull that yarn tight.

Step 12: You should have a stitch created on your needle and a new loop around your thumb.

Repeat steps 6 – 12 as for as many stitches your pattern calls for – remember, the slip knot counts as one stitch!

That’s how you do the long tail cast on!

If you are looking for a fun knitting pattern to work on your skills, check out the Primer Scarf Knitting Pattern!