For the sneaker obsessed, the Olympics are about more than medals. The games have long been an extended holiday in the footwear world, an event where ordinary shoes step onto hallowed ground—the track, the podium—and into history. The Olympics nurtured sneaker culture when it was young, galvanizing global audiences to pay attention to the patriotic colorways brands had on offer. Those brands have been, at times, as competitive at the Olympics as the nations and athletes they outfit, vying for supremacy on sport’s biggest stage. Who has made the best Olympic sneakers? What are the most memorable and important shoes connected to the games?
This is our ranking of the best Olympic sneakers. Like most of our lists, it comes with caveats.
We looked to organize the list through the lens of modern sneaker culture, meaning that some of the more ancient shoes with Olympic connections—Onitsuka Tiger’s original Cortez and Mark Spitz’s Adidas Gazelles aren’t on here as a result. The list also focuses on sneakers that were tied to the Olympics, either to be worn by athletes participating or consumed by fans watching. Yes, we’re allowing lifestyle sneakers in; Complex rarely looks at shoes strictly for their performance, so this isn’t a calculation of which Olympic shoes have won the most medals.
Nor is it a list of the best Olympic-themed sneakers in USA colors, although it may look like it. It is so heavy on red, white, and blue sneakers because America has set the tone for global sneaker culture more than any other country, and Nike, the sportswear brand that’s best capitalized on the Olympics, generally reserves its best efforts for the US, its home team.
The list consists only of shoes from Summer Olympic Games because the Winter Olympics have historically been less sneaker friendly and generally lacking in the kind of shoes that can translate into casual wear and thus transcend their sport. It features shoes only from the Olympics that have already taken place, although we could see models like the Nike Jam sneak onto a future ranking. It has a few non-sneakers, because there are some track spikes that can’t be ignored in the history of Olympic footwear.
These are the best Olympic sneakers, ranked. Debates, critiques, and reader suggestions motivated by geographical bias are all welcome.
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