Original Huel T-Shirt vs SF121 alternative

The Huel T-Shirt is unique thanks to its nice fit, texture, and flexibility.

However, it comes with a rather prominent Huel logo on the front and another tiny one on the back. And I very much don't like wearing clothes with labels on them.

While peeling the Huel logo from the T-Shirt is doable, it is quite a difficult task requiring a lot of patience. Attempting to remove it too aggressively may result in damaged fabric. And not removing it all the way may leave some of the glue residue in the fabric and a faint outline of the Huel logo may still remain. However, if you remove it just right, it's indistinguishable from a blank T-Shirt.

Huel T-Shirt after successful logo removal by peeling

Still, buying a blank T-Shirt outright might seem more sensible. As it happens, there are many posts on Reddit and threads on the Huel discussion forum praising the Huel T-Shirt. And the #1 question is where to get a blank version of the T-Shirt. However, the official response is that you can't, as they are custom-made. ^[1]

The most commonly mentioned alternative is the SF121 (SF Clothing Feel Good Stretch T-Shirt). It was often described as the closest you can get to the original. So I've ordered eight to properly test them.

After two months of wearing the SF121 (alternating with blank Huel T-Shirts), I can say the SF121 is quite similar to the original Huel T-Shirt in many ways, but also different enough in other qualities.

The main upside of the SF121 T-Shirt is that the feel is similarly comfortable to the Huel T-Shirt. The material composition is the same (96% cotton / 4% elastane), although the actual fabric quality isn't identical - the Huel T-Shirt felt just a tiny bit softer. Also, the price of the SF121 is very reasonable (at £8 / $11).

Huel T-Shirt (black) vs SF121 (white) width comparison (in cm), after washing

The main cons, however, include that the SF121 is considerably narrower. At size M (men's fit), the SF121 is 3 cm less wide around the hem, when laid down on a flat surface, compared to the Huel T-Shirt. This was the biggest disadvantage of the SF121 for me, as it made the fit around the waist too tight, almost like wearing a slightly loose swimsuit.

Another difference is in the fabric density/weight. The Huel T-Shirt has 185 gsm (grams per square meter), the SF121 has 165 gsm. When stretched, the SF121 was slightly more see-through (although this may be because I was testing the SF121 in white, and the Huel T-Shirt in the classic black color).

SF121 back side laid on the Huel T-Shirt (ISO banana for scale)

Perhaps buying the SF121 one size bigger would solve the tightness problem, but I worry that then it'd be too big in other dimensions. Especially, as the SF121 is already 1 cm longer (from top to bottom) compared to the Huel T-Shirt.