The Air Jordan 41 is here, and the launch colorway is called Ruby. It got a limited release in China on August 28 with a global release to follow, and it is built with no leather on it at all, which is rare across the numbered Jordan line.
That is the short version. The longer version is that almost everything about this shoe is different from the Air Jordan 40 that came before it, from the upper down to the bottom of the outsole.
The upper is nano print mesh, and there is no leather anywhere
Jordan Brand calls the upper nano print mesh. It is a woven base with a raised print laid over the top of it, and the crosshatch runs in two directions. Each of those directions takes color on its own, which is why the same construction can produce colorways that look properly different from one another instead of looking like one shoe in different paint.
In person it shifts as you turn it. Photographs flatten it out and make it look like a single block of red, which does the shoe no favors, because the texture is the most interesting thing about the upper.
Leather has been part of the signature line for most of its run, so a numbered Air Jordan with none at all is rare. The Air Jordan 40 used white tumbled leather with a nubuck toecap. The 41 goes all textile, and the weight savings are the reason.
ZoomX, a full-length Zoom Strobel, and Air in the heel
Underfoot the 41 runs a ZoomX midsole with a full-length Zoom Strobel, plus an Air Zoom unit in the heel. That heel unit is new. The Air Jordan 40 did not have one.
If you saw a spec sheet before launch that listed a Cushlon midsole, ignore it. There is no Cushlon in this shoe. Those sheets were drafts and they circulated widely before anyone had the final build in hand.
A carbon fiber and TPU shank handles stability, and it does not just sit under the arch the way a shank usually does. It runs up the lateral sidewall, so you can see the black weave through a cutout in the red tooling.
Flip it over for the window
The outsole is full-length HART rubber, which is a high abrasion compound that uses less material than standard outsole rubber to reach the same durability. Herringbone runs across the forefoot with a repeat texture design everywhere else.
Cut into the middle of it is a diamond-shaped window with clear TPU across it. Through it you can see fabric wrapped foam, the edge of the carbon fiber, and the edge of the heel Air unit. Turn the shoe under a light and the whole panel changes as the light moves through the TPU.
Windows in outsoles are not new. Doing one where the thing underneath is actually worth looking at is the harder part, and this one clears that bar.
The small stuff on the shoe
A few details are worth pointing out because they are easy to miss in product shots.
The lace eyelets are metal rivets set straight into the mesh, not the moulded plastic loops you get on a lot of modern performance shoes. Up close you can see the crosshatch running in both directions around them, and the two directions catch light differently, which is the whole trick of the upper in one square inch.
The tongue carries an AIR JORDAN wordmark that is debossed into the material rather than printed or stitched on. On the Ruby it is tonal, so it only shows up when the light hits it at an angle.
The laces are the one place where the shoe is not entirely red. They have a reflective fleck woven through them that picks up light and reads almost white in a flash photo.
On the heel, XLI is stamped into the heel of the midsole just above where the Air unit sits, and there is a Jumpman on the collar. The 41 in Roman numerals is a small nod to how the line used to number itself before it switched to digits.
Eight gemstone colorways are coming
Ruby is the first of eight. The full run is ruby, quartz, tiger’s eye, amethyst, jade, meteorite, pink diamond and opal.
Three of them have been explained so far. Ruby points at the three-peats. Amethyst is Michael Jordan’s birthstone. Opal is his alma mater. The other five, including the meteorite, have not been spelled out yet.
It is a real change of direction for the line. There is no heritage colorway in that list, no elephant print, and nothing named after a specific game.
How it compares to the Air Jordan 40
The 40 launched on July 12, 2025 at $205. It used full-length ZoomX with a full Zoom Strobel, a tumbled leather upper and a nubuck toecap, and it was designed by Jason Mayden and Leo Chang.
The 41 keeps the ZoomX and the Zoom Strobel, adds the Air Zoom heel unit, and swaps the leather for textile. So the cushioning gained a piece and the upper lost weight. That is the practical difference between the two if you are choosing between them.
Release and price
The Air Jordan 41 released in limited numbers in China on August 28, with a global release to follow. Retail listings put it at $205. Jordan Brand has not put an official price on it, so treat that as the best available number for now rather than a confirmed one.
Where to go deeper
I had the shoe in hand before release and sat down with the people who built it, including Leo Chang, who leads design for Jordan Brand basketball, and Donald Kelsey, who leads basketball and promo footwear. The full interviews, a spec comparison against the 39 and the 40, and a lot more photography are in my Air Jordan 41 piece on Sneaker History.
There are two videos as well. One is the full breakdown of the shoe, and the other is the interview with Jason Mayden of Jordan Brand.
