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Basketball season is in full force—in fact, some could say it’s better than ever.
Following Final Four fever and in lockstep with the NBA Playoffs, the WNBA is back, and timing truly couldn’t be better. The 30th celebratory season coincides with a watershed win for the players: a new collective bargaining agreement that establishes a $7 million salary cap.
The likes of A’ja Wilson and Breanna Stewart will be banking seven-figure salaries not just on WNBA time, but also in their own signature shoes. Each leading lady is just one of a handful of female footwear forces who’ve laced and led their own namesake sneaker.
In accordance with the season start, here is Every WNBA Signature Ever.
The 20 Best WNBA Players Right Now
Every Air Jordan Releasing in 2026
Player: Sheryl Swoopes
Year: 1995
How good was Sheryl Swoopes? So good that she had her own signature shoe before she had a proper place to play professionally. In 1995, the Air Swoopes debuted as the first female-faced basketball shoe from the Beaverton brand.
The Marni Gerber design was decidedly sleeker than men’s models of that era, belonging solely to Swoopes as seen in name and tongue tagging. Fans of the era will notice a pin-striped tongue similar to the Air Penny and a midfoot strap akin to the Adjust Force.
Player: Sheryl Swoopes
Year: 1996
Days after Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls won their 72nd game, the NBA Board of Governors announced a new league was on its way. The WNBA came to fruition with Swoopes, Lisa Leslie, and Rebecca Lobo at the forefront. On the feet of Sheryl? Her second signature.
The Nike Air Swoopes 2 upped the ante on personality by featuring a bilateral lacing system similar to that of the Reggie Miller and Eddie Jones-adorned Air Money. It’d be another year until the league tipped off, with Swoopes already on to her next shoe. However, living legend Nancy Lieberman laced the Swoopes sequel early and often in W action.
Player: Rebecca Lobo
Year: 1997
When Rebecca Lobo cut down the nets at UConn in 1995, she was wearing Reebok. In fact, all of her teammates were wearing Reebok, too.
Back when Geno Auriemma only had one National Championship to his name, he had Lobo to thank and Reebok as his backer. The latter two tied the knot in signature fashion with the aptly named Reebok Lobo: a Lady Foot Locker exclusive designed for the newly minted New York Liberty center.
Pearlized leather paneling conjured comparisons to the Question—a model Lobo also wore on court—while wavy lines and a jewel Vector were on par with Shawn Kemp signatures of the same era.
Nike Air Swoopes Zoom aka Swoopes 3
Player: Sheryl Swoopes
Year: 1997
Sheryl Swoopes’ inaugural WNBA season started in an unfamiliar place: on the bench. Thanks to the birth of her son, Jordan, the MJ of women’s basketball began her pro playing career not just as the face of a league but as the matriarch of a family.
Though Swoopes only played limited minutes for the Houston Comets in their championship debut, her kicks were all over the court. Sheryl wore the Nike Zoom Swoopes—arguably her best design—in only nine games. Thankfully, teammate Tina Thompson also laced the latest Swoopes shoe in her Comet ascent.
Player: Lisa Leslie
Year: 1998
Lisa Leslie left USC with every accolade imaginable, content with shelving her hardwood heroics for a life on the runway. Shortly after graduating and inking a modeling contract with Wilhelmina, Team USA called, and a women’s league quickly formed.
By her second season in the WNBA, both her pro pursuits aligned. The Nike Air Total 9 saw Leslie channel Chanel decades before Don C did so, placing pleated quilted leather and silver Swooshes atop a Total Air footbed.
Player: Sheryl Swoopes
Year: 1998
You see that wing on the Nike Air Swoopes 4? That’s Foamposite. Yes, Sheryl was really like that on court and on foot.
Though the Swoopes 4 isn’t as high on the retro wish list as her other favorites, the shoes speak to her finding her footing in the league she laid the foundation for. Back in the starting lineup and back in the WNBA Finals, Swoopes was four-for-four on signature shoes and two-for-two on WNBA Championships.
Player: Dawn Staley
Year: 1998
Ask 11-year NBA veteran Cuttino Mobley the best point guard he ever played with, and he won’t tell you Steve Francis or even Sam Cassell. He’ll say Dawn Staley: the 5’6” flash he competed with in the playgrounds of Philly.
Adored by Cat and Nike alike, the eventual coach claimed the Nike Zoom S5 as her first signature shoe. The Alpha Project design is on par with the Penny Hardaway and Jason Kidd classics of the same era, fitting a point guard who always defied expectations.
Player: Sheryl Swoopes
Year: 1999
Tuned Air is revered by retro running fans far across the pond, but is often forgotten for its minor moment in basketball. As the new millennium approached, Nike Basketball employed articulated Air cushioning on models for Tim Duncan, Scottie Pippen, and Sheryl Swoopes.
The Nike Tuned Swoopes aligned with the Comet star’s first All-Star selection and third championship. An Alpha Project design in all the best ways, the webbed upper looked like a mangled net, bolstered by visible carbon fiber and Nike’s newest Air unit.
Player: Cynthia Cooper
Year: 1999
This is the first time you’re seeing Cynthia Cooper’s name on this list, but it should be the second. The Nike Air Shake ‘Em Up is not only indebted to Cooper’s co-sign but also one of the best women’s basketball designs of all time.
Nevertheless, Nike formally called Coop’s number on the Air C14. Smooth and sleek, the first formal signature shoe for the 4x WNBA Finals MVP was as smooth and efficient as the woman who brought the Eurostep to the US.
Player: Nikki McCray
Year: 1999
The late, great Nikki McCray was the MVP of the American Basketball League before she made her WNBA debut. After an early ascent in Converse, the Tennessee alum was soon signed by Fila.
The Fila Nikki Delta headlined a reported $1 million deal with the Italian brand. Decades before Sabrina Ionescu tasked Nike to create a unisex signature shoe, McCray made the same request.
Player: Dawn Staley
Year: 1999
What happens when you cross the Nike Air Up ‘94 with the Air C14? You get the Nike Zoom S5 2.
Dawn Staley’s second and final signature shoe is not as wavy as her watershed original, yet still sleek and sneakily asymmetrical.
Player: Chamique Holdsclaw
Year: 2001
Despite having headquarters in New York, only one player donned a Knicks jersey on a SLAM Magazine cover in 1998. That player was college senior Chamique Holdsclaw.
A Christ the King prodigy in Queens and an All-American under Pat Summitt, the cover courted Holdsclaw’s last year at Tennessee as not just a chance to repeat as Naismith Player of the Year—she did—but as an audition for the NBA.
While Holdsclaw would take her talents to the Washington Mystics, Nike made her the female face of its Shox franchise. The Nike Shox BB4 Mique upped the ante on the Vince Carter proper, replacing paneled overlays with embossed bubbles.
Player: Sheryl Swoopes
Year: 2001
Already an All-Star, champion, and MVP, Sheryl Swoopes missed the 2001 WNBA season due to injury but still managed to drop her sixth signature.
The Nike Air Swoopes 6—a sister silo to the Hyperflight of sorts—featured a patent leather upper, exposed TPU support, and an Air Max heel unit. In truth, it was a souped-up version of the J-Will favorite.
Player: Chamique Holdsclaw
Year: 2002
In hindsight, Chamique Holdsclaw should’ve had her own Foamposite. Playing in Washington, DC, in Flightposite favorites no less, Nike instead aligned Chamique with the brand of boing.
The Nike Shox Mique was both loaded and luxurious, embellishing the VC favorite with embroidered paneling, hidden lacing, and a jewel Swoosh. Retail renditions and one-off PEs both outfitted the 2002 Rebound Champ.
Player: Sheryl Swoopes
Year: 2002
After a run of outlier oddities, the Nike Alpha Project zagged toward smoother, simpler styles in the early ‘00s.
The Nike Air Swoopes Premier refined patent leather flash for a team-friendly, low-profile signature finale to the storied franchise.
Player: Diana Taurasi
Year: 2005
Nike Basketball slowed its roll on signature shoes in the years defined by the LeBron James bidding war and arrival. A year after the King claimed his throne on campus, Diana Taurasi quickly courted her position at the Beaverton basketball brand as queen.
The Nike Air Taurasi was an upgraded Uptempo, complete with a signature logo, full-length Air, and a plush upper. DT PEs benefited from elephant print paneling, popping in Mercury tones.
Player: Diana Taurasi
Year: 2006
Chamique Holdsclaw and Diana Taurasi did something Vince Carter and Jermaine O’Neal could never accomplish: win scoring titles in Nike Shox.
The Nike Shox DT was straight out of the Shawn Marion cannon, featuring fluid patent pops on the heel-loaded line. In due time, Nike would retire the Taurasi line and instead feature her in PE placements across the LeBron franchise.
Player: Candace Parker
Year: 2010
Candace Parker won a National Championship, WNBA Rookie of the Year, and WNBA MVP in the same season. Marinate on that.
Down with the Three Stripes since her Tennessee ascent, Parker finally got the signature assignment fittingly in her third WNBA season. The Adidas Ace Commander saw a savvy use of striped strapping, backed by the same ankle braces that fellow Illinois native Derrick Rose made famous.
Player: Candace Parker
Year: 2011
The Adidas Ace Versatility gave the WNBA’s CP3 her second and final signature sneaker. Comparable in cut and composition to that of the Ace Commander, the Versatility scrapped the strap and carried over the patent paneling.
Player: Elena Delle Donne
Year: 2022
Despite a slew of stars—Sue Bird and Maya Moore instantly come to mind—the WNBA went ten years without a signature athlete.
Elena Delle Donne and Nike changed all of that in 2022 with the Air Deldon: a Fly-Ease-assisted signature shoe designed for accessibility and inspired by Elena’s sister Lizzie, who was born with autism and cerebral palsy.
Player: Breanna Stewart
Year: 2022
In 2021, WNBA All-Star, Champion, and MVP, Breanna Stewart, took a bet on herself and left a lifetime of Nikes. A year later, she became the first signature hooper at Puma since Vince Carter.
The Puma Stewie 1 was released in an array of bold and team-friendly colorways, giving the forward guard-shoe energy to match her feathery touch.
Player: Sabrina Ionescu
Year: 2023
Ball out at the University of Oregon? Check. Get stamped by Steph Curry and Kobe Bryant in workouts? Double-check. Receive the first female-led signature shoe from Nike Basketball in nearly 20 years? Check, please.
The Nike Sabrina 1 swept retail registers and basketball courts at every level, offering a unisex Kobe comp in a drought of Mamba makeups. In both inline and Nike By You fashion, the Ionescu franchise quickly became a breadwinner within Beaverton.
Player: Breanna Stewart
Year: 2023
Running it back with Puma, the Stewie 2 capitalized on the same cut and composition of the original, only adding sauce and scale.
The newly signed New York Liberty talent took color stories to graphic spaces of fire and ice, making her mark alongside LaMelo Ball as the brand’s signature stars.
Player: Sabrina Ionescu
Year: 2024
Continuing to draw inspiration from the Kobe cloth, the Nike Sabrina 2 slimmed down and highlighted the strengths of its predecessor.
Sheer mesh and exposed Flywire support were on full display across an array of colorways that not only spanned the NBA and NCAA but also supported Sabrina as she won her first WNBA Championship.
Player: Breanna Stewart
Year: 2024
Streamlined yet funkier, the Puma Stewie 3 upped the ante on personality while trimming the fat on bulk.
A myriad of makeups were more ornate yet louder than the graphic versions before, melding material overlays and obscure themes for a fresh take on the Stewie series.
Player: A’ja Wilson
Year: 2025
What’s delayed is not denied, and after years of waiting, the truth finally came to light with the launch of the Nike A’One.
Allowing A’ja Wilson’s dazzling personality a platform to shine through memorable marketing moments and all-time play, the A’One was released in accordance with a sensational season that saw the newly crowned signature star win MVP, Defensive Player of the Year, Finals MVP, and her third WNBA Championship.
Player: Breanna Stewart
Year: 2025
The Puma Stewie 4 is more than meets the eye, playing with layering and lacing in manners that don’t jump out but add intrigue.
Harry Potter collabs offered new layers of storytelling on the 2025 Stewie, with reviewers also raving about how they held up on court.
Player: Sabrina Ionescu
Year: 2025
The pleated panels and cabled construction of the Nike Sabrina 3 gave flashbacks to the Flyknit era, allowing for vivid gradient colorways on the 3-point champ’s third signature shoe.
Like previous pairs in her storied line, the NBA elite made them their own through Nike By You design, while the Oregon alum led all storytelling through “What the” colorways and “Grateful Dead” drops.
Player: Angel Reese
Year: 2025
Angel Reese was so popular in college that she earned a Reebok deal while playing at a Nike school. Making the most of her play and personality, LSU alum Shaquille O’Neal chose Reese to be the new face of the relaunched Reebok Basketball line.
By 2025, the NIL intro and All-Star ascent paid off with the Reebok Angel Reese 1: a signature shoe in the truest naming fashion, hitting all angles with aggressive design and thematic color blocking.
Player: A’ja Wilson
Year: 2026
Upping the ante on commercial visibility while diving deeper into her performance bag, the A’Two will be a true test of just how far Nike and A’ja can take it.
With A’ja already having every accolade on court and Nike Basketball leaning on W talent for juice, the signature sequel for the Aces star is a big, bright, and worthy bet on the best female hooper in the world.
Player: Sabrina Ionescu
Year: 2026
Same signature shape, new tech innovation, the Nike Sabrina 4 is instantly familiar yet aggressive in upgrades.
A retooled TPU FlyPlate takes track ethos to the hardwood, while Aero-FIT mesh makes for an enhanced cooling system. Give us Liberty and give us heat.
Upcoming Nike Caitlin Clark Signature
Player: Caitlin Clark
Year: 2026
Does Caitlin Clark have the most anticipated signature shoe…ever? It sounds like hyperbole, and it might be, but no one this famous and polarizing has been tied to an upcoming sneaker launch since Kanye West traded in his Swoosh for Stripes.
Save a signature logo, no leaked line sheets or sample shots have surfaced of the upcoming namesake Nikes for Caitlin. Until then, her Kobo Protro PEs break banks and ankles.
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