Nike Metcon 10 Brings Lightweight Agility and Stability to Functional Fitness Training

No functional fitness workout is ever the same, which means athletes need their training shoes to be highly versatile. They should be stable and grippy enough to support heavy lifts but also lightweight and flexible enough to be comfortable during short runs (like sprints and shuttle runs) and explosive plyometric moves.

The quest for ultimate performance versatility inspired the design of Nike’s original Metcon shoe. Athlete feedback has further perfected it, resulting in the latest iteration of the design, the Metcon 10.

Here’s a look at how Nike’s product design team updated this iconic shoe to meet the needs of professional, collegiate, and everyday athletes.

Generally made with a foamy, squishy sole, running shoes are usually lightweight but often lack the stability necessary for heavy lifts, such as deadlifts and hang cleans. Weightlifting shoes, on the other hand, aim to limit foot mobility, making them too clunky to be comfortable while running or performing dynamic movements. For a functional workout, which combines elements of both, athletes must pick a shoe that can support some aspects of their workouts but not others. But what if they didn’t have to? This is the question Nike sought to answer during the development of the Metcon shoe in 2015 and has fine-tuned with each new iteration. The Metcon 10 is the best yet.

Erin Gleason, Nike senior product manager, said the design team thoroughly reviewed athlete feedback and thoughtfully considered the various elements of CrossFit and metabolic conditioning programs to understand how they could make the Metcon 10 more functional than its predecessors.

“We’ve been maniacally focused on our training athletes and their needs and then delivering innovation that solves their problems,” Gleason says. “I think what I'm most proud of with the product is that we truly listened to the athletes.”

Based on what Gleason and her team heard, they knew the weight and mobility of the shoe needed to be improved without sacrificing stability. “Heavy lifting is a huge part of the programming in this space, but we also understand that you might go from doing barbell cleans or snatches into a one-block run,” Gleason says. “If you're doing a heavy deadlift, you want a shoe that allows you to feel like you can perform that movement efficiently with the right mechanics, but a shoe that supports that can be really clunky and miserable to run in. So when designing the Metcon 10, we considered how the shoe could support the heavy load while also making it slightly more runnable for that part of the workout.”

The first way Gleason and her team achieved this was by widening the forefoot — or the part that starts at the ball of the foot and ends at the tips of the toes. This tweak affords athletes the space to spread their toes and press through the floor, helping them gain stability and power during heavy lifts, Gleason says.

To further aid stability, the Nike team minimized the Hyperlift plate and added a firmer foam in the heel. These design updates also reduced the weight and stiffness of the shoe, improving agility without compromising stability.

The team also added new flex grooves to the design, allowing the foot to move more freely. Thanks to these new elements, Gleason notes that the shoe is more comfortable for cardio exercises.

In addition to being more flexible, lightweight, and stable, the Metcon 10 has other features that enable it to support a wide range of movements, from shuttle runs and rope climbs to box jumps and double-unders. These include:

• Smarter Grip: Athletes reported rarely doing rope climbs as part of their workouts, so the rubber wrap feature was redesigned and pared back to be effective but not excessive.
• Lockdown Fit: The Metcon 10 features a new lace lock system to keep laces secure and out of the way during high-intensity workouts. “During movements like box jumps and double-unders, the laces often shake up and down, and we’ve heard from athletes that it could be annoying,” Gleason says of the inspiration behind the feature.
• ReactX Foam Midsoles: ReactX foam provides athletes a higher energy return — or how much the shoe springs back upon landing — compared to previous Metcon shoes, which did not use ReactX foam. The ReactX foam also enhances cushioning and agility for movements like double-unders and sprints.

“We heard directly from the voices of our athletes, and we wanted to bring that voice to the center of everything we were trying to do,” Gleason says of the changes they made to the functional aspects of the shoe.

The athlete feedback and years of innovation went into creating the Metcon 10, and these efforts are finally coming to fruition with its worldwide launch on August 4, 2025. Work towards the best version of you and fuel your progress — one workout at a time — with the most versatile Nike Metcon yet.