The Most Expensive Sneakers of 2023

Don’t hate the player—hate the game. Or whatever people say these days. Reselling is here to stay, even if I no longer host a YouTube show where I ask people if they’ve resold sneakers. The market has cooled off over the past couple years, andetro Air Jordans are even finding their way to outlets. “Limited” collaborations aren’t selling out, and sneakers aren’t fetching the big secondary market values that they did just a few years ago. But people are still out here reselling.

This year’s big resellers included more Travis Scott x Air Jordans and high-fashion Nike shoes, but also limited-edition Asics, performance Adidas running shoes, and some new Nike Basketball sneakers. To find the data, we used information from StockX. We left off friends and family, special packaging, and most high-fashion sneakers. The values used here are the average resale prices across all sizes. Here are the most expensive sneakers of the year.

Retail price: $195
Resale price: $655
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This is the true definition of sneaker collecting. Ronnie Fieg and his brand Kith collaborated on the Asics Gel-Lyte 3 for the 50th anniversary of X-Men. It’s a sneaker he helped launch into the sneaker sphere, and his latest collaboration added a new foil, literally, of excitement. This time, the shoes all came blind box, like a pack of trading cards, so the buyer didn’t know what they were getting. He released some at Comic Con as well. The rarest of the bunch is the “Wolverine” edition, based off the character from 1975. My co-host, Brendan Dunne, pulled this one on the episode of The Complex Sneakers Show, where Fieg was a guest.

Retail price: $150
Resale price: $676
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This is probably the most boring hyped shoe of the year. But people still go for it. It still sets SNKRS app records. And for a lot of “casual” sneakerheads, it’s the biggest shoe of the year. They’ve taken L’s on every Travis Scott shoe, and people still want these for Christmas. It kind of doesn’t all add up but checks out at the same time. The latest version, a women’s exclusive, isn’t much different that the previous pairs, and probably more guys wore them than gals. Except the big footers out there. Either way, they still go for a chunk of change.

Retail price: $140
Resale price: $727
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Jordan Brand did not make a lot of these “Year of the Rabbit” 1 Lows this year. You’ve probably never seen someone wear them in the flesh. But you’d be surprised that so many resell on StockX. It’s a good colorway, has a cultural tie-in for a large group of sneaker collectors, and it’s rare and coveted. Sounds like a perfect hype equation to me.

Retail price: $150
Resale price: $742
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OK, so this one isn’t totally fair, because the Book 1, Devin Booker’s first signature shoe, hasn’t fully launched yet. But the first colorway, in all orange, came out in 500 numbered pairs. And, to no surprise, most of them hit StockX right away. Let’s wait and see how this sneaker is received as more colorways come out.

Retail price: $400
Resale price: $747
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This sneaker is a big “what could have been,” at least for now. The Nike Ja 1 had so much hype and anticipation, and Nike released a $400 pair decked out with a Swarovski crystal Swoosh at All-Star Weekend in Salt Lake City. The sneakers are creeping up toward $800. So people still want them, but the Ja 1 hasn’t become the ubiquitous shoe we all thought it would be at the top of the year. But there’s a chance that might all change with Morant’s return.

Retail price: $170
Resale price: $843
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If the Travis Scott x Air Jordan 1 Lows have reached mass saturation, then this shoe is either a good or bad thing, depending on who you ask. This year, Travis hit the links for a golf version of his shoe. It’s an interesting footnote to his footwear career. Although it seems like everything is getting turned into a golf shoe these days. The shoe launched an ad with golfer and sneakerhead Brooks Koepka, who infamously wore the Off-White x Nike Air Max 90s in black on the links.

Retail price: $250
Resale price: $911
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You were expecting another Gallery Dept. x Asics here, weren’t you? The brand’s Gel 2160, which first launched at ComplexCon, caused a bit of a stir this year for a few reasons. One, it was a good shoe. Two, people were shocked that it resold for $3,000. And three, like everything, there are people who didn’t know mesh runners had become one of the biggest trends of the year. But those shoes actually got a wider release, so it wasn’t fair to use the original data on them. The 1130 from the brand did not and goes for close to $1,000. Not as exciting, but much rarer. 

Retail price: $N/A
Resale price: $979
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Funny story. Out of all the times that people have talked smack to me on the Internet, no one has said any of it to my face in public—until ComplexCon this year, when someone approached me because I said RTFKT and Nike is dumb, and buying NFTs of sneakers is stupid because they’re not real. I stand by all of that. But someone approached me wearing these Takashi Murakami x RTFKT Air Force 1s because I said the shoes were a bad investment, because, at the time, they weren’t real. I told him that him wearing the shoes didn’t change my mind, and his friend seemed too embarrassed to join in on the convo. But hey, you tried it. Congrats, you have $1,000 sneakers.

Retail price: $400
Resale price: $1,155
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Is this a good shoe? People are certainly willing to spend a lot of money on it, although everyone on the Internet threw a fit about the retail price of the shoes ($400) before they came out. Kinda funny, because you can sell the sneakers for 3x that now. I’m still skeptical on whether or not these are amazing. But if you want to spend that much on them, have at it.

Retail price: $500
Resale price: $1,170
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It’s kind of funny that the number one shoe on the list is Adidas’ $500 running shoe that’s designed for competitive marathon runners. If you’re logging a six-hour marathon, just stick to the latest Pegasus or Kayano. And I didn’t think they’d make a huge splash, but a lot of people are spending upwards of $1,100 on a pair. Wild.