The Natural Fiber Score: How We Rate Activewear Brands

"Non-toxic." "Clean." "Chemical-free." "Natural." None of those words mean anything legally. Any brand can print them and most do.

So we built a score that replaces them with four things you can check yourself. Four pillars, five points each, twenty total. Every rule is on this page. Every score we publish links to the brand's own page, so if you think we got one wrong you can prove it.

We apply this to ourselves the same way we apply it to everyone else. We currently score 16/20, and we've published exactly where we lose points below.

Pillar 1 — Fiber Purity

What the body fabric actually is.

Score	Standard
5	100% natural fiber in every body fabric, shell and liner — and trims disclosed
4	100% natural body fabric, trims not disclosed
3	90–99% natural body fabric — a synthetic stretch fiber blended through
2	70–89% natural, or a semi-synthetic (viscose, modal, lyocell, bamboo) as primary fiber
1	Under 70% natural, or recycled polyester marketed as a natural alternative
0	Predominantly virgin synthetic

Why body fabric and not the whole garment. Nearly every garment made needs some elastane at the waistband — nothing natural delivers stretch recovery that survives hundreds of washes. Scoring that would separate nothing. What matters for skin contact, breathability and microplastic shedding is the fabric covering 95% of the garment. A short with 8% elastane blended through the body is a materially different thing from one with an elastic waistband, and this pillar says so.

What does separate brands is how the trim is constructed — a covered or core-spun yarn wraps the elastane in natural fiber so the synthetic never sits against skin — and whether the tags, labels and drawcords are natural fiber or the printed polyester nearly every brand defaults to.

On semi-synthetics. TENCEL, lyocell, modal and bamboo viscose are regenerated cellulose — plant-derived, chemically processed. They cap at 2 here. That's a limit of this pillar, not a health verdict on the fiber.

Pillar 2 — Chemical Safety

What a third party has verified about what's on the fiber.

Score	Standard
5	GOTS + OEKO-TEX across the line, certificate numbers published, and own-brand lab data published
4	GOTS + OEKO-TEX across the line, plus either published certificate numbers or published lab data
3	GOTS + OEKO-TEX claimed, nothing published to verify it
2	One standard only, or certification on some products only
1	In-house claims with no standard named
0	Functional chemical finishes present — DWR, antimicrobial, stain-resistant, wrinkle-free

A certification is a chemical test. Since 1 January 2024, OEKO-TEX Standard 100 has carried a general ban on PFAS, assessed by total fluorine at a limit of 100 mg/kg, with individual limits in Annex 4 for PFOS, PFHxA, PFHxS and C9–C14 PFCAs. GOTS 7.0 separately prohibits PFAS as a chemical input at every stage of processing, along with formaldehyde, azo dyes, chlorine bleach and heavy metals. If a garment carries either certification, it has already been third-party tested for this.

OEKO-TEX Made in Green ranks above Standard 100 — it requires Standard 100 compliance plus production in a STeP-certified facility.

Why an unpublished test scores nothing. Testing you can't read is a claim, not evidence. We apply this to ourselves: our own Eurofins testing is in progress and we score zero for it until the report is public.

Pillar 3 — Spec Transparency

Specifications, or adjectives.

Score	Standard
5	Fabric weight in GSM, named construction, all inseams, full composition, and fiber grade (merino micron or cotton staple)
4	Four of those five
3	Three
2	Composition plus one dimension
1	Marketing descriptors only — "buttery soft," "four-way stretch"
0	Composition not disclosed

A brand that knows its fabric publishes its weight. 290GSM and "midweight" are not the same claim.

Pillar 4 — Natural Performance Engineering

Does the garment solve odor, moisture, stretch and chafe through fiber and construction — or by adding synthetics and chemical finishes?

Score	Standard
5	Performance solved structurally — e.g. a merino liner for odor, thermoregulation and stretch — plus functional construction: secure pockets, a considered inseam strategy, and natural-fiber trims down to the tags and labels
4	Structural performance solution, basic construction
3	Natural fiber with no engineered performance answer — a plain cotton short
2	Performance delivered by blended synthetic stretch
1	Performance delivered by chemical finish
0	Synthetic shell with finishes

This is the pillar most guides skip, and it's the one that decides whether you'll actually wear the thing. Natural fiber is easy. Natural fiber that performs is an engineering problem.

The rules we hold ourselves to

1. We disclose that we wrote it, on every page that applies this score.
2. We never move a pillar so we win it. The pillar we lose is what makes the ones we win worth reading.
3. Every score links to a source on that brand's own site.
4. We re-score quarterly and date the page. Brands improve; a stale ranking is worthless.
5. We score our own unpublished work at zero, the same as anyone else's.

Where Wayve currently scores

Pillar	Score	Why
Fiber Purity	4/5	100% natural body fabrics — organic cotton shell, merino liner. Covered elastane at the waistband; cotton drawstrings, tags and labels.
Chemical Safety	3/5	Made with GOTS-certified organic cotton and OEKO-TEX Standard 100 dyes; certificate numbers not yet published; independent Eurofins testing in progress and scored as zero until it's public.
Spec Transparency	4/5	290GSM shell, 165GSM liner, named constructions, all inseams, full composition. Merino micron not yet published.
Natural Performance	5/5	Merino liner solving odor and thermoregulation structurally; zip side pockets; 4" shell over 6" liner; cotton drawstrings, tags and care labels rather than printed polyester. See the Quad Short.
Total	16/20

Two of those have obvious fixes and we're working on them. When they're done, we'll say so here.