The Best Shoe Racks of 2025
You can find hundreds of nearly identical shoe racks out there; our goal was to choose one that was not only sturdy and simple to assemble but also useful for a wide range of storage needs.
To help us understand the biggest difficulties most people face when it comes to shoe storage, we interviewed six professional organizers: Naeemah Ford Goldson, professional organizer and founder of the National Association of Black Professional Organizers (NABPO); Katrina Green, professional organizer and board member of NABPO; Rebekah Bashorun, professional organizer and founder of Organize for Love; Beth Penn, author of The Little Book of Tidying and founder of Bneato Bar; Abbey Claire Keusch, owner of Abbey Claire Professional Organizing; and Barbara Reich of Resourceful Consultants and author of Secrets of an Organized Mom. We also spoke with sales associate Bonnie Williams about her nearly 20 years of experience in the shoe department at Prada in New York City.
As anyone who has owned a crappy shoe rack can attest, certain factors will quickly turn any rack into more trouble than it’s worth, so we carefully considered the following criteria:
Stability: We wanted to find storage options that could handle the commotion of a regular household and hold up when jostled or bumped. When we scoured reviews, the number one owner complaint we noticed involved flimsy, wobbly racks that dumped shoes on the floor.
Capacity: We were looking for a rack that would easily hold a variety of shoe types and provide enough storage space to make it worth the purchase. We learned from reviews that people were often frustrated that a rack they bought didn’t hold as many shoes as it promised, or that it didn’t hold the specific kind of shoes they needed to store (like high heels and boots).
Ease of assembly: It was important to us that a shoe rack be simple to put together. So we looked for models that came with clear directions, needed few or no extra tools to assemble, and included good-quality, well-labeled parts.
Ability to customize: Because everyone owns a different combination of shoe types, and not all types fit perfectly on every rack, you’re unlikely to find the perfect, maximize-your-space rack without a little tweaking. That’s why we were especially interested in racks that allowed for some customization. They could be stackable, modular, or designed with shelves that are adjustable by height.
Style: Each rack’s styling and finishes factored into our decision. We think most people use a shoe rack inside a closet, where style isn’t of the utmost importance, but some people also want storage that will look nice out in the open. Even in a closet, racks that were too bulky seemed like a waste of valuable storage space, and racks without clean lines seemed like they’d be difficult to move around in a small area.
We researched more than 50 promising shoe racks before narrowing the field to our testing group of 15.
We tested how long it took to assemble each shoe rack—ranging from three minutes to nearly two hours. And we noted how clear the instructions were, how well the parts were labeled, and what additional tools (or knowledge) we needed. When a rack was adjustable, we tested that, too. We stacked multiple units, moved shelves, and added extensions to be sure that when a rack was used at full capacity, it would still perform well.
After we set up each rack, we filled it with shoes in a variety of styles and heel heights, as well as a range of other sizes—from tiny toddler shoes to a men’s size 12—noting how many pairs each rack held. And we checked for other variables, such as the space between tiers, the height of the first tier (to see whether a bonus row of shoes could fit underneath), and where each rack would work best in a home.
Finally, it was time for the “jiggle test”: We bumped, shook, and generally put each rack through its paces to see how stable and useful it was.
