The purpose of this study was to clarify the charactaristics of foot growth and the relationship between the shape of contact surface of the sole and the height of the longitudinal arch in early children. The left feet in 105 children aged 3 to 6 years were investigated. Foot breadth, heel breadth, and the length from the heel to the tip of each toe and to each metatarsal head were measured. The length from the heel to the distal end of the tibia and the fibula and their height were also measured. Inclination angle of the 1st metatarsal was detarmined to evaluate the height of the longitudinal arch. Contact surface of the sole was evaluated using Pedoscope. As the foot length increased with age, the measurements were expressed in values relative to the foot length. While the relative length (RL) from the heel to the tip of each toe did not change, the RLs from the heel to the 2nd-5th metatarsal heads increased with age, and the RLs of the 3rd-5th toes decreased with age. The RLs from the heel to the distal end of the tibia and the fibula decreased with age. This means that the growth of the frontal part of the tarsometatarsal was more conspicuous than that of the rear part. The RLs of the foot breadth and heel breadth did not show the chronological change. The inclination angle of the 1st metatarsal ranged between 16 and 30 degrees and showed no significant correlation with age, whereas the ratio of the noncontact area beneath the inside sole to the contact area increased with age. The correlation between the inclination angle and the relative noncontact area was weak though significant (r=0.258). These results seem to suggest that development of the relative noncontact area should be differentiated from that of the longitudinal arch in considering growth of the foot.