How do you get Lydia (or any follower) to wear better armor?

I've traded her upgraded armor and weapons and she uses the weapons, but not the armor. She still is wearing her starting steel armor, while walking around with epic quality dwarven armor, boots, gloves, and helmet.

She DID equip a steel horned helmet (as opposed to wearing nothing) but won't equip anything else.

Thoughts?

Never had an issue getting her to wear better armor. Started with Plate, then Elven, to Glass, to Dragon, then finally Daedric. I put them in her inventory and she put them on instantly. Now weapons I have had a few issues with. She seems to prefer certain types and I have had her equip a weapon that had much lower damage than what she already was using. Not sure why but there do seem to be some issues with it. I really don't understand why they refuse to let us remove her default gear. Seems kind of stupid really. Yea I know on the PC you can but I'm not on PC with this one..

Can you get them to wear normal clothes?

This isn't a dress-up game.
Stick to the sims if you want that.

I have the same problem, she took the 4 upgraded pieces but only wore 2 of them.

I don't know why, with my other characters, if it's an upgrade she takes it. Maybe she got mad at me because I upgraded my iron armor to steel.

I've not had any problems with Lydia using different weapons. One time she used her shield in one hand, and a lightning spell staff in the other.

She prefers some weapons over other I think, based on her being a 1H/Shield using warrior.

In the UEPSWiki, if you search for Follower, you get all kinds of info I wasn't aware off, like you can give them healing potions and they'll heal themselves faster than if you just wait for their health to come back up to full after a fight.

But, there's also a Google spreadsheet you can open with details on all the followers as far as how much health, weapons, etc.

She usually wears anything that's an upgrade. She wouldn't put the bracers on for me for some reason but I figured they weren't that much of an upgrade. However, I put some staffs in her inventory just to carry until I could get back into town to sell and she equipped two staffs and is raising all kinds of hell against the enemies with them.

OP, not sure why you are having trouble. Although, I can't speak for Lydia in particular, she died early on.

But I have had Belrand, Onmund, Aranea, Illia and a few others, and they have all put on armor. The only trouble I have is trying to get mage followers to wear enchanted robes. I have only witnessed Aranea put on some master robes one time. It was after we entered a building, and I thought "wow finally" then as soon as we exited, she took them right back off again and never put them on even once after that.

My mage follwers have no problem wearing any of the enchanted rings, shoes, circlets, necklaces or gloves I give them, but for whatever reason wont wear robes. Armor, no problem. Robes, no way.

Some people pickpocket her... but you need to be 100 pickpocket and perked to get items off her that she's using.

it's a built-in feature of the game.

What are talking about? What do you think all those close are for slick?

I know you just get on every thread and tell the OP how stupid they are or say something about how bad Skyrim svcks but at least try to put some thought into it.

The best method is to use the console, if you play on PC.

prid
equipitem
removeitem

The last one is necessary to ensure that the target NPC doesn't simply re-equip their old gear as soon as you leave the current cell.

Also note that the item you wish to equip on the NPC must be in their inventory in order to use this method.

And you're always there to defend them every single time.
I do think people care way to much about these dress-up aspects of the game, so that's what I'm posting about, it's a free forum, deal with it.

How is trying to give a companion better armour, so they have better stats and thus are more effective in-game, in any way reminiscent of The Sims? tad obtuse, methinks.

Different people place different emphasis on various aspects of the game. It's a free forum, deal with it.

So back on topic. Someone may be able to get a better answer to this but I do believe that followers have better stats when using certain weapon types and armour types and so tend to choose their preferred items. For example Lydia: I had a steel shield and an elven shield both the same level of protection but of course the elven was lighter, she wouldn't use the elven but would use the steel. Steel is a heavy class of armour elven is light. I think you will find similar things with other follower types.

I'm honestly not sure about this. I never could get Illia out of her Blue Mage's Robes and into something better without using the console.

Its a Roleplaying game. Thus, wearing clothes instead of the same thing over and over for someone who's trying to roleplay is important.

Companions have their own skills, and so will prefer armor/weapons they are proficient with. So Lydia, a Heavy Armor user, won't put on elvish armor since the armor rating is probably lower for her then the steel armor she comes with. However, I have noticed some followers are reluctant to swap out even if the items you give them are the same type (i.e. Heavy armor) but better (Dwarven, like in the OP).
For example my companion Erik the Slayer is refusing to use any bow I give him (orcish, dwarven, glass) and keeps using his rubbish starter bow. I think it's a bug to be honest.
And Mages won't change gear at all, unless I give them Light or Heavy armor.

I've given her Orcish and Ebony armor, and she wore them without problems.

Its an RPG customization comes with the territory. There are different armors and clothes for a reason, I know I change Armors and weapons on my followers constantly to switch things up a bit. And what do you care if someone is "playing dress up"? Unless you bought the game for them its not your concern.

They do have a preferred skill set, but I don't think the word "preferred" has anything to do with what the AI will choose to use. I think the word "preferred" describes the skills that are strongest on the character sheet (so to speak) for that particular NPC. This actually requires me to manage them properly. For example, I liked using Onmund for a long time. One of his preferred skills is 1H. If I give him an ebony sword, and an ebony longsword, he will equip the long-sword because it does more damage. I have to make sure that he only has the ebony sword in his inventory if I want to take advantage of is preferred skill set. Although, stuff like this isn't earth shattering in my opinion.

Followers will remove any additional gear and put on their default gear as soon as you tell them to part ways. So if Lydia is sitting at home, she'll be wearing her default steel armor.

When you ask her to re-join you, she won't always auto-equip better gear even if it is in her bag. Sometimes she will, but not always. To get her to change, take the upgraded gear away from her and give it back to her.

Aren't followers fun.

OP,
Lydia is form what I can see a one-hand + shield character. I've had no issues with armor, she's in Daedric but weapons she will use a one hand if she has a shield available. That is what I've seen when giving her multiple daedric weapons to see which she'd use and leaving that on her.

Edit: She ended up with Shield and Sword