A new benchmark report from Catchpoint finds that leading athletic footwear and apparel brands like Nike and Adidas rank near the bottom in customer digital experience, costing them up to $425 million annually in downtime losses.
Catchpoint’s 2025 Athletic Footwear & Apparel Website Performance Benchmark Report uncovers alarming gaps in digital experience across major sportswear brands. The report finds that Nike and Adidas rank among the worst in user experience metrics, bleeding up to $425 million annually due to site failures, slow page loads, and reliability issues. By contrast, challenger brands such as Fila, Under Armour, and New Balance are outperforming in client-side metrics, showing what strong digital foundations can deliver in a high-stakes category.
Every second of latency counts
Online shoppers have high expectations: digital hiccups translate directly into lost sales, abandoned carts, and damaged brand loyalty. For brands investing heavily in direct-to-consumer and subscription models, every second of latency puts revenue at risk. The report shows that even global leaders aren’t immune to these pitfalls.
Zooming out
This exposure comes at a time when the sportswear market is growing rapidly – projected to expand from about $206.6 billion in 2024 to over $220+ billion in 2025 and beyond. As brands race to capture omnichannel consumers, the difference between success and failure may lie in digital resilience.
The digital divide also mirrors structural shifts: brands that scale e-commerce without equally scaling performance infrastructure now risk self-sabotage. The report echoes broader trends: in retail, 70 percent of firms may present misleading dashboards when the true “experience score” paints a very different, harsher reality.
What’s next / What to watch
— Expect internal overhauls: IT teams will stress-test infrastructures, integrate real-time monitoring, and re-architect front-end systems.
— Brands may lean more into progressive web apps (PWA), edge caching, and fallback user interfaces to mitigate digital disruptions.
— In future reports, brands like Nike and Adidas will be under extra scrutiny – recovery in ranking will be a benchmark of digital maturity.
Dive deeper
— The Catchpoint: 2025 Athletic Footwear & Apparel Digital Experience Benchmark Report analyzes top 20 brands, includes real-user performance metrics from 120+ global locations
— Fortune Business Insights: Sportswear Market Trends, Share & Growth Analysis — global sportswear market size, growth projections
— BusinessWire: Sneaker and Sports Apparel Giants Are Failing at Digital — And It’s Costing Billions
