15 Best Places to Buy Shoes Online and In Person

Finding the Best Places To Buy Shoes: A Buyer’s Guide

Shoe shopping can quickly become a headache if you don’t know where to begin. While it’s amazing to have an endless supply of brands, styles, sizes and retailers at your fingertips, the process can become overwhelming. So, we recommend honing in on your must-haves.

If you don’t want to leave the comfort of your own home or be limited to just one store, for example, shopping online is the best way to go. If you have trouble finding the right fit, however, in-person stores may be better for you. (Just make sure you bring at least a thin, no-show pair of socks — you’d be surprised at how many people get athlete’s foot and other conditions from trying on shoes with bare feet!) Check out the other important factors to consider when finding the best places to buy shoes below.

What to Consider When Choosing the Best Places To Buy Shoes

When determining the best places to buy shoes, we considered the variety of styles each store had, specialty items, refunds and exchanges, customer service and price.

Styles

What style of shoe are you looking for? If you want a unique sneaker or hiking boot, for example, your best bet is an online retailer that specializes in that style — such as Foot Locker for athletic shoes. If you’re on the hunt for fashion-forward, dressy shoes, however, you may have better luck at big retailers, such as Nordstrom or Asos.

Specialty Items

Thanks to the internet, finding specialty items is easier than ever. However, not every online retailer sells unique shoes — in fact, many websites sell very generic and popular styles to cater to the masses. If you’re on the hunt for a shoe that no one else is going to wear, we recommend that you do some shopping at lesser-known websites, such as Forsake and KURU Footwear.

Refunds and Exchanges

A seller’s refund and exchange policies can make or break your shopping experience. So, it’s important to check it out before making a purchase at any given store. We’ve checked out the policies of every store we recommended, and we believe all our recommended sellers have reasonable rules.

Customer Service

Shoe shopping is a difficult task — not everything is going to fit well on the first go. When this happens, the customer service department will become your best friend or worst enemy. We made sure to check out the customer service reviews of every seller in our recommendations. For each of our recs, the vast majority of customers are happy with the customer service departments.

Price

Before shopping at any shoe store — online or in person — take your budget into account. If you want to spend less than $100, for example, you’ll have an easy time shopping at Amazon, Asos or Torrid. If ample customer reviews are important to you, we suggest shopping at sites like Zappos.

What Are the Different Types of Places To Buy Shoes?

Online

A majority of shoe sellers are online only, meaning they don’t have in-person stores. Online shoe stores have a few advantages: You won’t have to deal with mark-ups from third-party sellers and you can shop from the comfort of your own home. On the other hand, you won’t get to try on shoes before buying.

In Person

Nearly all shoe stores now have a website to keep up with the times. However, you may find that local shops such as consignment stores and boutiques don’t do business online. These stores aren’t always the best places to shop for mass-produced shoes such as high-profile sneakers, but they’re great for specialty items, vintage products and discounted products.

Online and In Person

These days, the vast majority of in-person shoe sellers have websites. This means you get the best of both worlds — you can shop for shoes on your laptop or phone and return them in person, or you can shop for shoes in person and return them by mail. The downsides? These stores don’t always offer the same shoes in person that they do online, and the return and exchange policies can get confusing.

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