By Sam Carey, Founder of Run Love Sprint.
Every few years barefoot running has another moment. It took off after Born to Run became a bestseller, faded when a wave of runners discovered the hard way that their calves weren't ready, and it's back again now, with minimalist shoes, wide toe boxes and "foot strength" all over social media. If you've been tempted to try it, or wondered whether your cushioned trainers are making your feet lazy, the research has moved on enough to give a reasonably clear answer, and it's more nuanced than either side of the debate tends to admit.
The case for barefoot and minimalist shoes
The strongest argument for going barefoot or minimal isn't really about running faster or getting injured less. It's about the muscles in your feet. Modern running shoes do a lot of work for you, with cushioning, structure and stiff soles, and the theory is that the small muscles inside the foot get less of a workout as a result.
There's now decent evidence that training without that support makes those muscles bigger and stronger. A 2025 systematic review in the Journal of Clinical Medicine (opens in a new tab) pulled together seven studies, most of them involving recreational runners, and found that barefoot or minimalist strength training consistently increased the size of the foot's muscles and improved toe strength and arch control. In one of the studies it included, runners who switched to minimalist shoes for six months (opens in a new tab) increased the volume of their foot muscles by around 7 to 9%, while a group who stayed in normal shoes saw no change. In another, twelve weeks of barefoot exercise training increased toe-gripping strength by around a third.
The reviewers were careful to point out the limits. The studies were small, the programmes varied widely, and bigger foot muscles didn't always translate into a stronger or better-functioning foot. The best results came from longer programmes that mixed strength, balance and agility work over several weeks, rather than a few toe exercises on their own.
The case for caution
Running barefoot is a very different thing from strengthening your feet barefoot, and that's where the picture gets more complicated.
A randomised trial published in Scientific Reports in 2021 (opens in a new tab) asked 41 young adults who had never run barefoot to do a weekly 15-minute treadmill run for eight weeks, either barefoot or in cushioned shoes. The barefoot group had lower running stability, meaning their stride was less able to absorb the small wobbles and disturbances that happen with every step, and that didn't improve over the seven sessions. The researchers were honest that we don't yet know exactly what lower stability means for injury risk, but it's a reminder that the body doesn't adapt to running without shoes as quickly as enthusiasts sometimes suggest.
The injury evidence points the same way. When researchers followed 61 trained runners for six months in a randomised trial by Fuller and colleagues (opens in a new tab), 16 of the 31 runners in minimalist shoes picked up an injury compared with 11 of the 30 in conventional shoes. That difference wasn't statistically significant overall, but heavier runners were noticeably more likely to get hurt in minimalist shoes, with the risk roughly doubling for runners weighing around 86kg. An earlier study by Ridge and colleagues (opens in a new tab) found signs of bone stress in the feet of more runners who had moved to minimalist shoes over ten weeks than in those who hadn't. And a review of how runners transition (opens in a new tab) found injury rates tended to be higher during the switch, at around 18 per 100 runners compared with 13 per 100 in normal shoes, although again the difference wasn't conclusive.
It's also worth remembering that the most thorough look at the evidence, a Cochrane review from 2022 (opens in a new tab), found no strong proof that any type of running shoe, minimal or cushioned, reliably prevents injury. Your training load, recovery and injury history matter far more than what's on your feet.
So should you try it?
For most runners, I think the sensible answer is to separate the two ideas. You don't need to change your running shoes to get stronger feet. Doing simple foot and calf exercises barefoot at home a few times a week, such as calf raises, single-leg balance, toe curls and gently doming the arch of your foot, gives you much of the benefit the research describes without the risk of running miles in unfamiliar conditions.
If you do want to try barefoot or minimalist running, treat it like learning a new skill rather than swapping one pair of shoes for another. Start with walking and a few minutes of easy running, perhaps on grass, and build up over months rather than weeks. Expect your calves and Achilles to feel it, because the load shifts away from your knees and onto your lower legs and feet. And be particularly cautious if you're on the heavier side, have had a stress fracture before, or are in the middle of a marathon block, when the last thing your body needs is a new kind of stress.
Barefoot running isn't the miracle its biggest fans claim, and it isn't the injury trap its critics describe either. Like most things in running, it comes down to doing it gradually, listening to your body and choosing what you'll enjoy enough to keep doing.
This article is for general information and isn't a substitute for advice from a physiotherapist or healthcare professional.
