Real talk: When was the last time you stretched out your toes? If the answer is, um, never, TikTok would like to have a word with you. Fitfluencers are raving about the power of toe spacers to help you avoid injury, run better, and improve your balance and posture.
But do they actually work, or is it just another social media trend that doesn’t pass muster?
Well, it depends on who you ask. “Foot and toe mobility is kind of a controversial topic,” California-based physical therapist Jacob Van Den Meerendonk, DPT, tells SELF. While some experts think that giving your little piggies a good stretch has serious perks, others aren’t sold. Yet the more scientists look into what the tiny muscles in our feet can do for us, the more we’re learning that we should probably be giving them a little more love. And, yes, that might include taking advantage of toe spacers.
So…what are toe spacers, anyway?
Essentially, toe spacers do exactly what their name implies. “They put a space between your toes,” Pennsylvania-based podiatrist Alicia Canzanese, DPM, president of the American Academy of Podiatric Sports Medicine, tells SELF. Typically made out of silicone (or sometimes cloth), these tools slip in between each of your toes, spreading them out away from each other. “They’re meant to restore the natural alignment of the foot structure,” Dr. Van Den Meerendonk says.
Toe spacers can help strengthen your feet, which can benefit the rest of your body too.
The theory is that readjusting alignment allows us to use the smaller muscles of our feet more effectively. Most of us need an assist in that department thanks to a lifetime of wearing shoes that squeeze our tootsies into a too-narrow toe box: When your toes don’t have enough room to move around, the little intrinsic foot muscles can’t work the way they were meant to and end up weak, Dr. Canzanese says. “Using toe spacers is a way [to] help retrain your brain and encourage those muscles to activate more,” she says.
The benefit: stronger, more mobile feet—which can mean healthier feet. “There’s evidence that [suggests] that if we have an increase in control of our foot mobility, that we’ll see less injuries within the foot, specifically plantar fasciitis or Achilles tendinitis or any tendinitis of the foot,” Dr. Van Den Meerendonk says.
You might see ripple effects above the ankle, too, thanks to improved balance and better mechanics from the ground up. “Take, for example, doing a squat in the gym,” Dr. Van Den Meerendonk says. “If we don’t have the stability in our feet to get down into a low squat position, we displace stress to our knees or our hips or even our lower back.” It’s not just a theory: Studies have shown that stronger feet can decrease the risk of ankle sprains and ACL ruptures, potentially reduce falls in older adults, and relieve pain from shin splints.
More foot control can also help you see some performance gains, since improving your biomechanics could help you move more efficiently. “Wearing a toe spacer, you’re not going to shave a minute off of your mile time,” Dr. Canzanese says. But it’s one small step that, when combined with other smart strategies like targeted cross-training and proper recovery, could potentially add up to a PR. “More and more, we’re seeing those small muscles are probably more important than we’re all letting them off to be,” Dr. Canzanese says.
Just keep your expectations in check if you’re using a toe spacer for bunions.
Dr. Canzanese says most people who come into her office asking about toe spacers are trying to fix a bunion, assuming that forcing their big toe back into a straight line will get rid of the problem. Unfortunately toe spacers can’t erase one that’s already there. Especially if it’s led to a bone spur, no amount of stretching will magically make that extra bone growth disappear. But, she says there’s good reason to believe that spacers might be able to help keep a minor bunion from getting worse. “If you strengthen up those foot intrinsic muscles, use those toe spacers to help encourage that toe to have a better glide, you can help prevent the bunion from progressing as quickly,” she says.
Start small—but put your toes to work too.
Begin by wearing your toe spacers while you’re barefoot around the house, Dr. Canzanese says. If you have shoes that are wide enough to fit spacers inside while you’re walking or running, you can try that too. But don’t head out the door for a half marathon. Aim for about 5 to 10 minutes to start; once you’re used to them, you can shoot for a half an hour at most, Dr. Van Den Meerendonk says. (Depending on how thick the material is and how cramped your toes are, spacers can feel pretty intense and uncomfortable at first.)
The best way to use toe spacers isn’t just to slip them on and forget them. To really get the most out of them, Dr. Van Den Meerendonk suggests doing some dedicated toe mobility exercises when you put them in. “You can’t just wear them and go to bed and think that everything is going to be better in the morning,” he says. Instead, he recommends working on things like splaying out your toes even farther than the toe spacers. Or you can do “toe yoga” where you lift up your big toe off the floor while holding down your smaller toes (then vice versa). He regularly does these moves with spacers on when he’s working from home at his desk.
That said, you don’t need spacers to strengthen your feet. “You can also engage those small little foot muscles by just doing some barefoot exercises,” Dr. Canzanese says. She suggests trying toe yoga by itself, or foot exercises like arch doming (bringing the ball of your foot toward the heel) or picking up a towel or marbles with your toes—no TikTok shop purchases required.
Also, if you have poor circulation or neuropathy that causes numbness in your feet, you might be better off without spacers altogether, since you could end up getting blisters or irritated skin without realizing it. At the very least, Dr. Canzanese recommends checking in with your podiatrist or doctor before trying them.
The bottom line? Toe spacers can be a useful tool to help you gain better control over your feet, which could potentially have some real benefits. But, “the toe spacer is never going to be the magic bullet that a lot of people on the internet want it to be,” Dr. Canzanese says. For healthier feet, you likely need to put in some work too.
Related:
- Why Your Big Toes Play Such a Huge Role in Your Health and Fitness
- 24 Best Shoes for Plantar Fasciitis
- The Best Insoles for Flat Feet, According to Experts
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