How to Knit Jogless Stripes in the Round

Learn to knit Jogless Stripes in the Round. Either on your circular or double-pointed needles, when changing yarn colors for horizontal stripes, this little trick will help keep your yarn change edges looking clean.

Unlike knitting flat, where we stack the next row directly above the last each time we start a new row, knitting in the round is actually knitting one continuous spiral.

As such, your new color in the first stitch will be directly below the new color once you knit all the way around your work on your last stitch.

Knitted sample in horizontal stripes in pink and white yarn color on circular knitting needles.

This results in a very obvious color change that has a jagged look. In knitting, it’s called a jog. This spiral isn’t something we can change, but there is a quick little fix to create jogless stripes to help them look better to the naked eye.

PRO TIP: This technique for creating jogless stripes when knitting in the round looks best when you are knitting three or more rows of color change stripes.

Swatch of knitting showing the first and last stitches without the jogless stripes technique.

FOUR STEPS TO KNIT JOGLESS STRIPES IN THE ROUND

There are a few different recommended techniques out there to fix that little jog when knitting stripes in the round. And I’ve tested them all. Luckily for us, I discovered that the very easiest technique actually looks the best, so let’s stick with that one!

STEP 1: TWIST YOUR YARN COLORS BEFORE YOUR STITCH MARKER

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STEP 2: KNIT FIRST ROW NORMALLY

Simply knit all the way around your first row once. On your first row knitting in your new color, simply knit that entire row without doing anything differently. Just knit the entire row in the new color.

Knitting normally demonstration with needles and yarn.

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STEP 3: Slip your first stitch purlwise on the second row.

On the second row of knitting, take your right needle and pick up the first stitch on your left needle in the new color as if to purl.
Place it onto your right needle as a slipped stitch.
For all subsequent stitches in that row, simply knit all the way around.

Close up of stitches on a knitting needle.

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STEP 4: KNIT SUBSEQUENT ROWS

Keep on knitting until it’s time to change yarn colors again, then repeat with Step 1.

Knitting demonstration with pink yarn and needles.

ADMIRING OUR JOGLESS STRIPES IN THE ROUND

Let’s take a look at exactly what this jogless stripe technique did to help our rows look cleaner. In my example, I’ve knit four rows total in a new color. Looking closely, you can see that there are only three stitches at the beginning of our stripes. Our slipped stitch created one very long stitch.

As I mentioned earlier, this spiral effect when knitting in the round isn’t something we can change. This is a quick little fix that helps our yarn change rows look a lot cleaner.