The modern soccer cleat market is one of international diversity and offers a multitude of brand options never before seen in such varieties & categories. Each brand today offers different silos of boots, each with different characteristics to cater to the diverse market needs.
For the longest time, black and white leather boots consumed the market space, with a rare occurrence of red or blue boots every so often. The only choice a consumer had was the brand they sported. Nowadays, boot colorways vary from everything across the rainbow, and leather is far from being the only material available; Options are virtually unlimited & there is a boot for everyone.
This breakdown article will go through the overly complicated tiers of boots offered by modern day brands. For the sake of simplicity and demographical precision of this piece, I will be using Adidas, Nike & Puma and their current products as examples.
Adidas & Puma Tier Breakdowns
Ever since their complete line revamp around 2015, Adidas has been offering 4 different boot silos along with the standalone Mundial models which have not been changed or modified for some time. These 4 silos have been differentiated with different names, however the tiers within each silo have been differentiated by Numerical descriptions (ex: Predator Freak.1 & X Ghosted.3). You can find all the latest Adidas offerings at Premium Soccer's Adidas footwear collection.
The same can be said for long-time German sports competitor Puma. They, like Adidas, have offered different silos of boots each with numerical descriptions to differentiate the tiers within each silo. With adidas for example, a silo is broken down by .1, .2, .3 and .4 versions of the model with 1 being the highest and 4 lowest. Adidas does include special case with a + model above the .1 which refers to a laceless variation for each silo.
Puma however have now swapped their system around to remain different, They now include 2 numerals in their model descriptions. The first numeral represents the tier and the second represents the model's generation. Example, a Puma Ultra 1.2 is the top tier model but second generation of the Ultra. Whereas the Future Z 3.1 is the 3rd tier of the model and first generation of the model. You can find all of Puma's newest offerings at Premium Soccer's Puma footwear collection.
Now to be clear these tiers are different price ranges of a model made to offer the model to people with different budgets in mind. With this price change of course comes a quality change, however the base colorway & overall basic aesthetics tend to remain similar throughout the tiers
Nike Tier Breakdown
Nike for the longest time has been the brand not using numerals in their tier breakdowns. Nike, along with brands New Balance & Mizuno and Diadora, uses different labels for each tier of boot within their lineup of silos. Currently the Nike silos are broken by Elite, Pro, Academy & Club tiers. Elite being the highest in price & quality with the Club being at the other spectrum. Again like Adidas & Puma, the prices vary between each tier and so does the quality. Nike tries to maintain a consistent base aesthetic & color throughout each of their silos.
You can find all of Nike's newest offerings at Premium Soccer's Nike footwear section.
