Tenor or soprano for adult beginner

I have both Kala and Makala Sopranos and their nut widths are 35mm or 1&3/8” - some other major brands are even narrower. On the Kala I replaced the nut and spaced the strings to 30mm centres, a definite improvement but having played for several years now the slightly closer spaced strings on the Makala are less of an issue than they once were.
(Edit. I think that that is most likely down to a combination of improved technique, familiarity and changes in my fingers. The skin on the end of your finger tips gets tougher as you play and so the fingers interact differently with the Uke.)
IMHO players with bigger fingers should avoid narrow spaced strings ‘cause, in my experience, they are an impediment to playing well.

Barring strings presents it’s own issues but, depending on your finger size and strength, a wide neck might possibly make the task more difficult. What’s much more important though, I believe, is how well the action is set-up and where the fleshy parts of your figures fall on the strings.

I agree, Sopranos can be small slippery things to hold. Once I learned to cheat by using a strap (lower bout to headstock) they became just perfect for much of my playing.
One thing to check, some time ago my friend bought a ukulele with a 1.5" neck. Messing around and comparing it to my Mainland with a 1 3/8" neck and visually we could see the one with the wider neck had more space on the outside of the strings. We measured it and found that the distance between the first string and the fourth string were the same on both ukuleles, and the bridge spacing as well. That sort of defeats the purpose. In that case one could always put a new nut on their uke and widen the spacing out over the width, but there isn't much that one can do with the bridge. Anyway, it was some off brand cheapie and I attributed it to that, but if I were going to buy a wide neck ukulele, regardless of the brand, I would have them measure that distance just to make sure before I bought it.
 
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