What Do They Do and Why Do They Look So Weird?

The Hyperboot is not discreet. They are big and bulky and look like they are meant to accompany an astronaut on a moonwalk. Though by now, most runners, casual and professional, are used to colossal-sized running shoes, these are larger still—and by a lot. The reason for the chunkiness, and the secret sauce of these recovery shoes, is that they have the same built-in air compression technology that you’ll find in the Normatec boots (Hyperice bought Normatec in 2020).

Better known as intermittent pneumatic compression (IPC) devices, they use a system of air pumps and chambers to inflate and deflate in a regularly repeating pattern. The idea behind this is that by expanding and collapsing in a systematic way, blood flow and the movement of lymphatic fluid increases, allowing for better circulation and removal of waste, and, theoretically, faster recovery—all while you are seated, resting and relaxing.

In addition to this squeezing technology, the Hyperboot added one more feature: heat. While you are getting your feet and ankles squeezed, the device heats up. Because heat is known to relax muscles, adding it in with the compression technology should enable even more blood flow and fluid movement; also, heat just feels really nice.

What Do the Boots Feel Like?

Unfortunately, I don’t hate them. I say unfortunately because truly, who actually wants to fall in love with a $900 recovery shoe?

Unlike the Normatec boots or similar compression sleeves from other brands, the Hyperboot is meant to be both a recovery and warm-up device, meaning that to get the most benefits from them, the shoes should be worn both before and after a workout. Runners and other athletes often fall into three camps: they are warm-up stans, recovery devotees, or both. I fall into the oft-forgotten fourth category: I despise—and purposefully forget about—both. But for the sake of this review, I pretended I belonged firmly in the third category.

During my two-week stint wearing the Hyperboot before and after every single run—I promise!—which ranged from easy three-to-five-mile runs, a couple faster interval workouts, and an 8-mile longer run on the weekend, I found myself looking forward to my workouts solely because that meant I got to spend some time in the boots. Having spent a decent amount of my free time in Normatec Legs during numerous marathon builds circa 2018 through 2022, I know the “fresh legs” feeling these devices can create. It’s an undeniably gloriously light, airy experience. The new Hyperboots did not disappoint on this front. And the addition of heat created this feeling of stepping into one of those foot baths with a massager, but without the added messy water setup and cleanup.

The setup of the boots themselves was straightforward. The boots are charged via two USB-C cords that are plugged into a wall charger. The charge will last for about 1.5 hours (that is plenty of time in the boots; see below.) There are four buttons: an on/off button, a compression button, a heat button, and a start/stop button. Both the compression and heat buttons have three ranges of intensity.

Once you’ve strapped in and turned the device on, the Hyperboots will compress to each foot. Pressing the start/stop button will begin the sequential compressions and heat. At first, I turned both settings—compression and heat strength—up to max. While the intense compressions were not bothersome (rather the opposite), the heat quickly became unbearable. The heat ranges in intensity from 111-degree Fahrenheit on the lowest level to 125-degree Fahrenheit on the highest level. Be warned: the highest level was so hot that I had to remove the shoes mid-session (though not so hot that I had to run them under cold water or I got a burn, don’t worry). I’ve since learned that either I’m a wimp when it comes to heat or the boots are simply too hot. Either way, I was only able to tolerate the shoes on the lowest possible heat setting. Even with that setting though, the feeling of a hot water bath comes through just fine.

I was surprised how much the shoes made my feet and ankles feel fresh, relaxed, and equally refreshed to begin a workout, as well as restored if I had just recovered from one. The main concept behind the boots, according to Hyperice and Nike, is that your ankles and feet are important but both forgotten and tricky areas to treat. Technically, the Normatec Legs do cover your feet and ankles, so if you already own a pair of them (and they are the exact same price as the Hyperboot right now), you might be wondering what more the Hyperboot can provide.

Having tried both, I will say that the Hyperboot provides a more targeted compression of the ankle compared to the Normatec Legs, and once you’ve finished, you can really feel the difference. The Hyperboot made my ankles feel light, airy, and ready for my next workout. Just as significantly, the addition of heat was not insignificant. It made a notable difference—subjectively!—to how I felt after wearing them.

Technically speaking, the shoes are designed so that you can stand, walk, sit, or travel all while getting the compression and heat benefits. On that note, the shoes are TSA-approved for carry-on, according to Hyperice. But also on that note, if I am being blunt, I had a lot of trouble forcing myself to leave my apartment in these shoes. Inside my apartment, I could wear them for hours all while cleaning, cooking, and doing other housework. The midsoles are extremely comfortable and the boots, in general, have a propeller-like feel similar to the feeling of wearing carbon plate racing shoes. However, I did feel like I got the most benefit from them just by sitting down, relaxing, and letting the compression and heat work. And, because I care deeply about my readers, I forced myself to wear them outside twice: once to get coffee and walk around my neighborhood and another time to a grocery store. Many people looked at my feet. Nobody asked questions.

Do They Actually Help You Recover Faster? What Does the Science Say?

It’s undeniable that these shoes make your feet happy. But how does that translate into true recovery? And what evidence do we have to back that up? That’s where things get trickier.

The compression device technology was originally developed for bed-bound hospitalized patients to prevent blood clots. The periodic compressions mimic what would happen if someone were to, say, walk the length of a hospital wing, which is probably the same distance as one city block or less. Doctors knew that prolonged immobility increased the risk for blood to clot, so by mimicking movement, these boots would reduce the risk of these dangerous clots in a person who couldn’t move. Later on, the founder of Normatec, a doctor named Laura Jacobs, further refined these devices to specifically help people dealing with postoperative lymphedema in breast cancer. Her device was then introduced to the athletic community as the Normatec Legs. If it can help blood flow and lymphatic drainage in immobile, hospitalized people, then it might help athletes, too.

But there’s a catch to this. The difference between an athlete—from elite to amateur—and an immobile patient in the hospital recovering from surgery is that an athlete can walk a city block. And unfortunately, there’s still little evidence to suggest that these compression devices do anything more for recovery than a walk can provide. The Hyperboot is new, so there aren’t independent studies on its effectiveness. However, since the Normatec Legs came out, there have been a number of studies looking into whether these devices help in recovery.

A 2020 study published in the International Journal of Exercise Science followed 10 distance runners (five female and five male runners) and monitored how they felt after runs that ended in a session with compression boots (Normatec Legs or ones similar) and runs that didn’t include a post-run session. The study concluded that “there appear to be no substantial benefits of IPC in promoting recovery.” A 2024 meta-analysis, which pulls together a bulk of studies all on the same subjects and looks for overall trends, published in the journal Biology of Sport, looked at 17 studies, which included a total of 319 participants, and concluded that the boots provided “a trivial to moderate effect” on pain and muscle soreness markers and “a highly variable effect” on markers that look at muscle damage. The authors found that this technology “might be a method with potential effects for recovery in sports, mainly reducing perceived soreness.”

The problem is that, as Christie Aschwanden, author of Good to Go, about the science of athletic recovery, told Runner’s World, it’s really hard to measure what recovery is or means as “there’s no single physiological measure—not heart rate, body temperature, or hydration status—that will tell you whether or not you’re recovered.” In fact, ‘How do you feel?’ is a common way to monitor recovery.

In that vein, the Hyperboot did make me feel good. I felt better after wearing the boots than I did before putting them on. This was true every time I wore them. And I looked forward to wearing them, so much that they made me look forward to harder workouts that I otherwise was somewhat dreading. However, at $900, if I could get the same benefit that the Hyperboot provides by walking to and from the park where I run instead of starting my run as soon as I leave my apartment, I’d probably opt for that. Though it wouldn’t be as relaxing or fun.