Last updated on April 13th, 2021 at 10:59 pm
While you may enjoy hiking difficult terrain, don’t forget the other companion that helps you keep going – your hiking boots. No matter how perfect your hiking boots, they unfortunately won’t last forever. Since it isn’t always easy to tell when boots need replaced, we’ve put together this post to help you understand how long they might last, and when your hiking boots need replaced.
Hiking boot lifespan depends on where they are worn, and their quality of construction. Most hiking boots can last between 500 and 1200 miles depending on these variables. Comfort, safety, and damaged material should all be taken into consideration when determining if a pair of boots need replaced.
If not replaced in a reasonable time frame worn down boots can cause blisters, joint pain, and discomfort. Below we go over how you can tell your boots are spent, so you have a better idea of when you need to get a new pair.
If you think your boots definitely need to be replaced you can hop over to our post on how to pick the right pair of hiking boots.
Listen to Your Body (and your feet!)
Observation of unusual discomfort or pain might be the first (and most obvious) sign you need to replace your boots.
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Discomfort often comes first, but it can lead to pain if you don’t make the necessary adjustments. For me, I can tell I need to replace my boots when my knees start aching a bit more after hikes.
Yes…worn down footwear CAN cause joint pain. Below are some other points of discomfort you should look out for:
- Your feet feel tired or worn down after a hike.
- You feel like you are over-pronating for no reason.
- Ankle or knee pain pop up out of no-where
While pain and discomfort aren’t necessarily caused by an old pair of boots, it definitely can be the culprit.
Believe it or not, the increased support offered by newer boots can actually positively impact aches and pains.
Where To Check for Wear-and-Tear in Hiking Boots
Old boots might still need replaced even if they aren’t causing discomfort and pain. When this is the case it is often because the boot(s) have incurred some form of damage that makes them less effective.
If you aren’t sure whether your boots have been damaged during their travels, below are where you can check for signs of wear and tear:
1. Worn Down Boot Treads
If you see you aren’t getting the traction you need while hiking, you may want to take a look at the bottom sole.
It is not uncommon for one or more treads to eventually wear off during hikes. This can be a nightmare for the functionality of any boot.
Muddy wet conditions can can make a harmless hike dangerous. This is particularly true if you lack the footwear to traverse those trails safely. Slipping on a decline or on mossy rock can be serious.
If you notice missing treads on your boots, the issue isn’t fixable, and it would be wise consider finding replacement boots as soon as possible.
2. Boot Eyelet Failure
Hiking boots come with a variety of eyelet types. Whether hooked or traditional eyelets it becomes possible over time that these will fail.
Laces can eventually pop hooks off or rip through the eyelet holes. These often show signs of loosening before total failure. So it is definitely possible to check your eyelets for signs of weakness.
Luckily, if this is the only issue on your boot it may be possible to do a repair. This may require you send the boots off to a repair shop, however, which could become costly.
3. Laces Have Been Replaced (multiple times?)
Laces are one of the most vulnerable parts of a boot. They are drenched in water, caked in mud, and exposed to the worst elements – and then we put extreme pressure on them to hold our feet in place. No wonder they are one of the first parts of a boot to fail.
Keep an eye on how worn your laces are getting. It can be a good indication of your boots’ age because its gone through the same conditions your laces have.
If you have gone through a pair of laces already, its time to check your boots for other failures. If the rest of your boot is in good shape, purchase another pair of laces, and check your boots in another 100 miles.
4. Waterproofing Boot Failures
If you purchased waterproof hiking boots, but find your feet get wet every hike, it is very likely there was a failure somewhere in your boots waterproofing technology.
Once you damage a membrane intended to keep water out, is in nearly impossible to fix in most boots. In this case, water will almost always find its way in, and then once in the boot it becomes likely your entire sock will become moist.
You don’t necessarily need to replace boots that are no longer waterproof. If they still provide the support you require, and they aren’t hurting your feet, you can keep using them… as long as you’re okay getting a little wet.
If the above doesn’t describe you, and you want waterproof boots to actually work, you might want to check out some waterproof boots at a store near you.
5. Compacted Midsoles
Your hiking boots mid-sole is designed to provide you with additional support. This synthetic material can lose its effectiveness over time.
How can you tell your boots have lost their support?
You can carry out a simple test called a “press check” and see how much support there is in your mid-sole.
Push upward on the bottom of your hiking boot as a way to form pressure against the mid-sole. When you do this, your mid-sole should form a bunch of very small creases. This indicates your boots still have cushion. If your boots do not have compression lines, or only have a few rigid ones, it is very likely your mid-sole support is decreasing.
While this test might be more effective on soft mid-soled speed hiking shoes, it is still applicable to the majority of hiking boots.
A boot with poor cushioning and support will increase the likelihood of experiencing sore joints and muscular aches. For this reason, a overused mid-sole is a perfect reason to get a new pair of boots.
6. When Hiking Boot Ankle Support is GONE!
Ankle support is often a benefit of wearing hiking boots. When this starts to happen to your boot, you might not notice until rolling your ankle on an oddly placed tree root.
Believe me, it only takes rolling your ankle once to start paying more attention to the worn down ankle support on your old boot.
Sometimes you can observe how firm your ankle support is very easily. As the support breaks down, the material may start to sag away from the boot when the boot is un-tied.
If you can’t tell by observation, you can do the following:
- Put on both boots
- Lace them completely up
- Tie your laces
- Slowly do a squat to feel how much pressure your boots put on your ankles
If your ankle supports don’t feel firm when doing the above you likely need to start considering new boots.
Do Your Boots Bend Easily (The Bend Test)
The “bend test” is one way you can tell if the shoe remains strong enough to support your body. It is a largely casual test of your boot, but it is used by many experienced hikers as a way to see what kind of support remains.
How do you try out the bend test? There are just two steps to follow:
Step 1 – Take the shoe in your hands; left hand over the toes, and right hand over the heel. Try to fold (or bend) the toes and heel upward above the laces.
Step 2 – You should notice while bending that the bending becomes more and more difficult as your hands get closer together. If your boots are in bad shape your hands will touch or almost touch while doing this test.
You may find that your boots don’t bend much at all. If this is the case for you, congratulations, you likely have a decent amount of support remaining in your boot.
Knowing When You Need to Replace Footwear
Hiking boots can last years depending on a variety of factors. This is why it can be so difficult to know exactly when they need switched out.
It is also difficult to know when your boots are over-used because boots are more rigid by design. Changes in an ankle support, or damage to the upper, might be more subtle because of the built in rigidness of the boot.
With good care you will be able to maximize the life of your hiking boots. With that said, there is only so much proper cleaning can do to the life of the footwear.
Even when treated perfectly, every hiking boot getting regular use, will ultimately need replaced. Hopefully this post helps you figure out when you need new boots.
Image Credit: Doug Beckers |(https://www.flickr.com/photos/dougbeckers/) | Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic (CC BY-SA 2.0)
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