Abstract. In this study, characteristic optical sizes of ice crystals in synoptic cirrus are determined using airborne measurements of ice crystal size distributions, optical extinction and water content. The measurements are compared with coincident visual observations of ice cloud optical phenomena, in particular the 22° and 46° halos. In general, the scattering profiles derived from the in-situ cloud probe measurements are consistent with the observed halo characteristics. It is argued that this implies that the measured ice crystals were small, probably with characteristic optical radii between 10 and 20 μm. There is a current contention that in-situ measurements of high concentrations of small ice crystals reflect artifacts from the shattering of large ice crystals on instrument inlets. Significant shattering cannot be entirely excluded using this approximate technique, but it is not indicated. On the basis of the in-situ measurements, a parameterization is provided that relates the optical effective radius of ice crystals to the temperature in mid-latitude synoptic cirrus.