Hiking Boots vs. Hiking Shoes (and Trail Runners)
Use this handy (...er, footy?) guide to determine which trail footwear is best for you.
Table of contents
I won’t speak for the rest of the Better Trail staff, but in my opinion, choosing the correct footwear is the most important hiking gear decision you can make. That applies, of course, to sizing—always try on whatever boot and shoe you’re considering before you hit the trail. But before you get to that step, you should decide which footwear category best suits your adventure profile. Doing so can seem like a tall task: The pros, cons, similarities, differences, and crossover traits between hiking boots, hiking shoes, and trail running shoes make for a long list. To simplify your research, here’s a helpful breakdown of each footwear type.
Hiking Boots: Tried and True
Hiking boots are the traditional choice for backpacking, thanks to their reinforced, over-the-ankle construction and sturdy base. As with most hiking footwear, this category has evolved, and while there are some throwback models with thick leather constructions, most modern boots weigh roughly 2 to 3 pounds for a pair.
Hiking Boot Pros
Support
Backpackers, take note: The most likely reason we’d recommend someone opt for a hiking boot is if most of their time outdoors is spent carrying a significant amount of weight—say 30 pounds or more. The foundation and stability that hiking boots provide are unmatched, and they’re the best bets for preventing sore feet and rolled ankles under hefty pack loads.
The very nature of a mid-cut boot design that rises to or above your ankle adds some stability compared to low-cut hiking shoes and trail runners. Hiking boots are also more likely to be bolstered with external components like semi-rigid overlays or extended TPU frames, stiff underfoot shanks, and midsole materials that prioritize structure rather than cushion. All of those design elements combine to help your feet bear the weight of a fully loaded backpacking pack, instead of feeling like you’re slipping around and overburdening your footwear, as you might in lighter, less supportive hiking and trail running shoes.
As with any gear performance metric, the amount of support and stability granted by a hiking boot varies with the model. Some of our favorite burly options for staying confident and comfortable under heavy loads are the Lowa Camino Evo GTX, the Salomon Quest 5 GTX, and the Lowa Renegade Evo GTX Mid, all of which will help you schlep a heavy pack without feeling outmatched.
Protection
There are plenty of hiking boots that have the same build as their shoe counterparts—the Keen Targhee IV Mid Waterproof and its low-cut sibling come to mind—and thus are outfitted with the same toe bumpers, midfoot overlays, rock plates, and padding that protect your foot from trail obstacles. However, boots offer an extra dose of protection thanks to cuffs that hit at or above your ankle. If that doesn’t seem like much, consider the terrain you’ll be spending most of your time in: Mellow dirt singletrack might not present many opportunities for you to pick up a nasty ankle knock, but miles of boulderfields or steep, root-filled trails? You might want more coverage up high—especially if you’re hoofing an overnight pack.
Because hiking boot designers are also less concerned with keeping weight low than if they were designing hiking shoes or trail runners, it’s also more likely that a boot will feature a leather or thick synthetic upper. Those are inherently more protective than the thinner uppers commonly found on lighter footwear, and offer more defense against abrasions and bruises. Protection, support, and durability (which we’ll tackle below) often go hand in hand for ruggedly built boots, and so all of the models we’ve mentioned so far are also great bets for backpackers who want to safeguard their dogs in sharp, broken terrain.
Durability
This is an interesting crossover point between hiking boots and trail shoes. Because so many footwear manufacturers offer mid-cut models with low-top counterparts, it’s not a hard-and-fast rule that boots are more durable than shoes. (The Merrell Moab 3 Low, for example, should last just as long as its boot version.) However, the same logic that we just employed for protection applies here, too. If you’re deciding between a boot and a shoe and want to prioritize toughness and longevity, it’s more likely the former will be made with materials that hold up for multiple seasons of hard hiking. Thick leather uppers and bombproof synthetic builds are much more common in hiking boots than other trail footwear; keep in mind, though, that there are impressively durable lightweight hiking shoes out there as well, such as the NNormal Tomir 02.
Hiking Boot Cons
Weight
This is by far the biggest drawback of choosing a hiking boot, but it comes with caveats. Modern boots—those with speed-oriented designs, which basically graft a tall cuff on top of a lower portion that looks like a standard hiking shoe—are impressively light, with many coming in around 2 pounds per pair. While that’s heavier than hiking shoes, it’s still light enough to mostly mitigate the foot fatigue usually associated with heavy boots over high-mileage days.
However, getting a light hiking boot (the Altra Lone Peak Hiker 3, perhaps, or the Merrell Moab Speed 2 Mid GTX) can rob you of the benefits you’d pick a boot for in the first place. Featherweight mid-cut models offer far less support, protection, and durability than heavier competitors; unless you're specifically craving the performance of a trail shoe with added ankle protection, you’re better off opting for a more substantial boot.
If you do that, be prepared for a stride that probably won’t feel very spritely, especially as the miles add up. Although there are supportive, protective boots that weigh between 2 and 2.5 pounds, the category’s standout workhorses often come in above the 2.5-pound mark. We don’t think you’ll regret wearing them if you’re tackling expedition-worthy pack weights and gnarly trail conditions, but keep in mind that you won’t exactly be fleet of foot.
Clunkiness
The same goes for precision and nimbleness, both of which are usually inversely proportional to a boot’s structure and armor level. A wide, bulky boot like the Targhee or the Hoka Kaha 3 GTX (our pick for the most comfortable model in the category) is great for confidence under a pack and warding off bruising, but it’s less ideal for picking your way delicately among talus or across a narrow ridge. As with any performance category, boot agility is a spectrum—there are more sneaker-esque models like the Keen Targhee Apex Waterproof Mid that are much more spry than heavy leather warhorses. But if you’re looking for footwear that will feel at home when you’re scrambling or moving fast, you should buy a hiking shoe or a trail runner.
Decreased Comfort—Potentially
This is less of an objective drawback than the ones we’ve just discussed, but it’s good to keep in mind. To be clear, there are plenty of super-comfortable hiking boots out there; thickly cushioned, accommodating models like the Kaha 3, the Altra Olympus 6 Hike Mid GTX, and Moab Speed 2 Mid are some of the most hiker-pleasing footwear on the market, regardless of category. And because fit and personal preference are so important, it’s likely (and totally acceptable) that someone will find a boot not exactly known for its comfort to be the best thing they’ve ever worn.
If we’re going by the law of averages, though, hiking boots take longer to break in than shoes, are heavier (which can affect comfort over a long day), and have less energetic midsoles. All in all, they’re a bit more taxing on your feet than low-top trail footwear. Imagine a huge asterisk next to that statement, though—if you carry more weight than your hiking shoes or trail runners can handle, discomfort will quickly set in. Make sure you have the correct footwear for the hike at hand.
The Big Myth: You Have to Backpack in Boots
Here’s the TL;DR answer to perhaps the most common trail footwear question there is: No, just because you’re going backpacking doesn’t mean you have to wear hiking boots. This is especially true if your pack is relatively light: Under a reasonable load—say, 25 pounds or less for comfort, and maybe 30 pounds max—a supportive low-cut hiking shoe or trail runner will get the job done. If you’re towards the higher end of that weight spectrum, you’ll probably want a burly model, such as the Keen Targhee IV or the Salomon X Ultra 5 GTX.
Hikers who have their lightweight kit dialed, though, can go with something geared more towards speed—one of our testers hiked 650 miles of the Continental Divide Trail in the Topo Athletic Traverse and boasted of happy feet nearly the entire time (for more, read our in-depth Traverse review).
Hiking Shoes: The Middle Ground
Most hiking shoes share basic features with hiking boots, including a protective upper, a grippy outsole, and a stable base, but have a lower collar just below the ankle. This category started as an answer for day hiking but now encompasses everything from multi-day backpacking to mountain approaches and more. Hiking shoes weigh roughly half a pound per pair less than an equivalent hiking boot.
Hiking Shoe Pros
Versatility
As we’ve mentioned a few times already, wearing hiking shoes does not preclude you from carrying backpacking gear, and there are plenty of shoes that offer enough protection for trails that would normally be rough on your feet. But there’s still a key difference between shoes and boots: If you spring for a low-cut design, you’ll immediately gain an advantage in terms of the different types of terrain and trips that your footwear performs well in.
Whereas the burliest hiking boots will feel like (and are) overkill for a mellow day hike, the same doesn’t really apply to shoes that are lighter, allow more natural strides, and are usually a bit more breathable. It’s more likely that a trail shoe will allow you to wend your way through terrain that requires delicate foot placement, something a bulky hiking boot would not be ideal for. If you like to keep your hikes varied in their length, topography, and difficulty, a shoe will make a much more adaptable companion than a boot.
There are a bunch of hiking shoes that perform remarkably well across a number of disciplines. The Merrell Moab Speed 2 GTX is one of our favorites among the new breed, while the brand’s Moab 3 Waterproof is a leather-bound standout of the old guard. We’ve already sung the Topo Athletic Traverse’s praises when it comes to lightweight durability and no-holds-barred traction, while the Hoka Anacapa Low GTX offers a max-cushion midsole and lots of support, without the all-consuming bulk of its mid-cut boot version.
Nimbleness
A large reason hiking shoes are more versatile than boots is how comparatively agile they are. Decreased weight and bulk, along with the lack of a cuff, will grant even the most overbuilt shoe a more light-footed feel than its mid-cut version, and the further down the trail you go towards speed-oriented designs, the more spry your footwear will make you. (Well, ideally. We can’t speak for the state of your knees.) Models like the La Sportiva Bushido III and the Hoka Speedgoat are primed for moving fast through alpine terrain, while the Topo Athletic Traverse and its brethren are specifically built for biting off huge days on thru-hikes.
The quicker your feet are, though, the less likely they are to feel stable under a heavy pack or protected in harsh terrain. We’ll get into those qualities later on in this section, but as a general rule, it’s good to remember that those qualities tend to decrease as the walkability of a hiking shoe increases. The inverse holds true as well: The low-cut iterations of the Targhee IV and the Moab 3 may provide tons of stability and armor, but they make it a heck of a lot harder to up the pace.
Comfort
Comfort is such a subjective and sometimes nebulous quality that you should take any discussion of it with a grain of salt (especially in trail footwear), but we’re inclined to think that finding a hiking shoe that keeps your feet happy is easier than finding a boot that does the same. Lighter weights and more breathable constructions go a long way towards that goal, as do uppers that are more likely to be synthetic instead of leather (less break-in time) and midsole/outsole constructions that are less stiff.
Having said that, it’s likely that the most cumbersome hiking shoes won’t match the comfort of some of the svelter boots on the market; we think you’ll probably stride and feel better in the mid-cut Merrell Moab Speed 2 GTX, with its rockered outsole, synthetic upper, and sub-2-pound weight, than the 2-pound, 6.4-ounce, flatter, leather-clad Keen Targhee IV shoe. And to return to that talus-sized grain of salt, we’ll reiterate that the most comfortable hiking footwear is often the shoe or boot that fits best. No amount of padding, breathability, or nimbleness can make blisters disappear.
Hiking Shoe Cons
Less Support
The heavyweights in the hiking shoe category have enough backbone for most backpackers, but if your goal is to reap the rewards of what low-tops are best known for—agility and comfort—you’ll get diminishing returns here. The models that are quickest on the trail achieve that by employing more responsive (but less stable) midsoles, less reinforcement around the midsole and upper, and lighter upper materials that, combined with everything else, provide less lateral stability.
This doesn’t have to be a major drawback, per se, especially if you don’t plan on wearing your hiking shoes on gear-heavy backpacking trips. Hikers who tend to recreate in the frontcountry or who pack light don’t really have to worry about this at all; just don’t forget that you might end up with sore feet if you push your shoes past their limits.
Less Protection
We touched on this in the hiking boots section, but mid-cut footwear offers more coverage than shoes that lack cuffs. That means that the low-top versions of even the burliest boots are less protective, and all of those rubber bumpers and TPU overlays won’t be able to prevent your ankle from picking up knocks. Additionally, as with support, the more a trail shoe promotes fast-and-light hiking, the less effectively it’ll shield your feet.
This isn’t to say that all agile shoes won’t protect you at all; even some featherweights like the Traverse and the Bushido III come equipped with underfoot rock plates and rudimentary toe caps. But it’s safe to say that if you frequent trails that always seem to want their pound of flesh, a boot would probably be the better call in the long term. (You can also apply this reasoning to durability; heavy hiking shoes that are the low-cut versions of brawny boots should hold up fine, but lighter models will fall apart more quickly if you take them into sharp, rocky terrain.)
Trail Running Shoes: The Modern Choice
Thru-hikers, who put fast-and-light travel as their North Star, get credit for popularizing trail running shoes as an ideal hiking option. Often weighing just over a pound per pair, these flexible and cushioned low-top shoes are exceptionally nimble and comfortable right out of the box. They have their downsides (covered below), but nowadays, you’ll find trail runners on the feet of everyone from day hikers to mountain athletes, backpackers, and more.
Trail Runner Pros
Built for Speed
Trail running shoes possess the most obvious use case out of the footwear types in this article. But they’re not the fleetest of the bunch just because they’re more stripped down than hiking boots and trail shoes. (Although that is a major advantage, and some of them are fantastically light, such as the 1-lb. NNormal Kjerag 02.) Rather, there’s a host of specific design elements that make them the only correct choice when you want to really kick it up a notch.
These shoes feature forefoot areas that are more heavily rockered than the fronts of hiking shoes. That allows you to roll through your strides more naturally when you’re going fast, and you probably don’t have to worry about pounding too hard: Our favorite trail runners of the moment, such as the La Sportiva Prodigio Pro and the Brooks Cascadia Elite, are built with max-cushion midsoles that dampen impact—they’re way less supportive than a hiking shoe or a boot if you’re wearing a loaded pack, but they’re also much more energetic and poppy. Trail runner midsoles are made with springier EVA, TPU, and—at the premium end of the category—supercritical foam (nitrogen-infused versions of EVA and TPU) that provide tons of rebound.
You also won’t find any trail running shoes made with unwieldy leather or super-thick synthetic uppers. It’s all thin, breathable mesh in this category, which will allow your foot to feel less confined and cut ounces. The same goes for running outsoles, which, while offering fantastic traction courtesy of the Vibram Megagrip and similar compounds offered by more substantial boots and hiking shoes, are more pliant and provide a more adaptable contact point with the trail (or whatever you encounter off it). Put simply: While certain hiking boots and shoes might have some characteristics intended to put some pep in your step, every feature on a trail running shoe is designed with speed in mind.
Trail Runner Cons
One-Track Minds
All that design work put toward moving quickly has its disadvantages, though. Chief among them, perhaps, is that trail running shoes are the least versatile outdoor footwear. Their relative lack of support makes them ill-suited for backpacking weights (think 30 pounds and up), and they offer much less protection than either boots or shoes. You’ll feel the effects of that stubbed toe or unseen rock underfoot much more harshly. We’ve reviewed a few models with rock plates (the Brooks Cascadia 19, for example), but high-level trail runners are more likely to feature propulsion plates, which are meant to generate energy and snap. Their dedication to minimal weight dictates that toe bumpers and protective upper overlays will be minimal at best, and sometimes nonexistent.
Plenty of hikers, backpackers, and thru-hikers are willing to make these tradeoffs for the very real benefits of such lightweight footwear. But it’s undeniable that trail runners leave your feet the most vulnerable (unless you’re into hiking sandals…) and are most likely to wear out first.
Finding the Right Match
Across the board, hiking footwear has trended lighter and more flexible over the past decade—a win in our eyes—but all three design types still have their place. Below is a breakdown of our top picks, organized by category, with a superlative description for each. These haven’t been arbitrarily selected: the Better Trail team has fully reviewed 68 trail shoes and boots at the time of publishing, and tested hundreds more over tens of thousands of trail miles (that’s no exaggeration).
Hiking Boots
Max-cushioned and comfortable: Hoka Kaha 3 Mid
All-rounder for hiking and backpacking: Salomon X Ultra 5 Mid
Fast-and-light: Merrell Moab Speed 2 Mid
Traditional leather design: Lowa Renegade Evo
Hiking Shoes
Overall standout: Merrell Moab Speed 2
Stability and support: Keen Targhee IV
Standout traction on rock: La Sportiva TX4 Evo
Thru-hiking specialist: Topo Athletic Traverse
Trail Running Shoes
Our top pick for hiking: La Sportiva Prodigio Max
Roomy, thru-hiking favorite: Altra Lone Peak 9
Exceptional durability: NNormal Tomir 02
it's trail o'clock
Hiking Gear Guides
Gear Guide
Best Hiking Boots of 2026
Gear Guide
Best Hiking Shoes of 2026
Gear Guide
Best Trail Running Shoes of 2026
Gear Guide
Best Hiking Pants of 2026
Gear Guide
Best Hiking Daypacks of 2026
Gear Guide
Best Trekking Poles of 2026
Gear Guide
Best Rain Jackets of 2026
Gear Guide
Best Synthetic Insulated Jackets of 2026
Gear Guide
Best Fleece Jackets of 2026
curated for you