I've been doing 25-30 km a week for about eight months in a pair of GBP 45 supermarket-brand shoes and nothing hurts. My club mates are all in GBP 160-180 shoes and keep telling me I'm one long run away from a problem. My budget is GBP 120 if there's a real reason to spend it, otherwise I'd rather put it toward a race entry. What actually changes between the cheap shoe and the expensive one at my mileage?
Politely disagreeing with the top answer on one point: foam is not the only thing you're buying. Uppers and outsole rubber on cheap shoes tend to go first, and I've had two budget pairs where the heel counter collapsed while the midsole was still fine. If your current pair has no creasing at the heel after eight months, ignore all of us.
Fair. I'd still say the foam is where most of the money goes, but a blown-out upper ends a shoe just as effectively.
What you're paying for at GBP 150 isn't safety, it's foam that still gives something back at 500 km instead of feeling flat at 250. At 25 km/week your cheap pair hits that wall in roughly ten months, so the maths is closer than your club thinks. The thing I would actually spend on is a shoe that suits your foot shape, bought somewhere that lets you return it after a run outdoors.
First answer that gave me a number instead of a vibe. Ten months is roughly where mine are, which explains a lot.
Worth adding that dead foam is not a cliff edge. You notice your legs feeling beaten up the day after a long run well before you notice anything about the shoe itself.
Eighteen months in and I did exactly the upgrade you're describing. The biggest change was psychological. I ran more because I liked putting them on. That's not nothing, but it is also not GBP 105 of biomechanics.
Nobody here can tell you whether your knees are fine, and if the club mates are implying an injury risk, that's a physio conversation rather than a shopping one. On the money question, I'd buy last season's version of a mid-tier shoe at half price and put the rest into the race entry.
Two cheap pairs rotated beat one expensive pair for me. Alternating days, both lasted noticeably longer in calendar terms than a single pair run daily did.
@soloseat_sana · last mo.
I own three pairs in that GBP 150 bracket and I regret two of them. Both regrets were bought because a review called them the best daily trainer, and both were too narrow through the midfoot for me, so I ran them into the ground out of stubbornness. The price told me nothing. The 45 minutes I spent trying on five pairs told me everything.
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