Nike SB Dunk Low “Watermelon” Is Out and Trading Below Retail

Nike SB’s summer Dunk Low has been going around as the Watermelon, and for once the nickname is half Nike’s own doing. The brand’s colorway string for HQ1625-301 reads Green Noise/Light Curry/Off-Noir/Watermelon. Watermelon is one of the four color names Nike assigned it. What Nike calls the shoe on SNKRS is duller and more accurate: the Dunk Low Pro in Green Noise and Light Curry. The pair is out, and it is not hard to find.

The Dunk was not built for skateboarding. Nike’s own history page places it in the 1985 to 1986 college basketball season, designed and shipped in roughly six weeks so college teams could play in shoes that matched their school colors. Nike’s newsroom dates the Be True to Your School program to June 1985 and names the twelve schools it launched with, from Georgetown and Syracuse to UNLV and Kentucky. The entire point of the shoe was color blocking, which is the same reason it still works as a canvas forty years later.

Nike SB came later than most accounts suggest, and being precise about it matters. The division launched in 2002, after an unsuccessful in-house attempt at a skate shoe in 1997. The Dunk Low was among the first Nike SB models that year, rebuilt with a thick padded tongue, a padded collar and Zoom Air underfoot. Four other models followed, and a refined Dunk SB line arrived in March 2004 aimed squarely at California skaters. The earlier version of this post said early 2000s, which is true and useless. 2002 is the year.

Suede covers the upper, and Nike’s SNKRS copy is unusually chatty about it, describing luscious suede over a Green Noise and Light Curry base with hot-pink Watermelon accents, padded collar and tongue, and Air Zoom cushioning. The green and the yellow take most of the surface area and the pink turns up in the smaller details. One thing this post had wrong is worth stating plainly rather than fixing quietly. It described a black and gum sole. Nike does not specify the sole color anywhere on its own pages, and the two outlets that do describe it disagree. JustFreshKicks says black and gum. Sneaker Bar Detroit says an Off-Noir midsole over an orange rubber outsole. Off-Noir appears in Nike’s own colorway string and gum does not, which leans toward the second reading, but until Nike or a clear photograph settles it this post is not going to assert either.

This is an in-line Nike SB colorway with no collaborator attached, and that is the whole story. Nike SB’s calendar has spent years being defined by the pairs that are hard to get, so a plain seasonal Dunk Low arriving at skate shops in a full size run is the part of the program that actually serves skaters. Flatspot in the UK had it before most US shops, which is the skate-shop distribution model working the way Nike built it in 2002 rather than any sign of scarcity. There is precedent for the name, too. Nike SB put out a Dunk Mid Pro Watermelon under style code 314383-363 back in 2013. Whether this pair is a deliberate callback is not something Nike has said, so treat the resemblance as a resemblance.

The resale numbers are the tell. StockX shows 644 sales over the last three months at a three-month average near $132, with current asks down around $76. A Dunk Low trading under retail is not a failure. It is what happens when Nike makes enough of a shoe, and for anyone who wants to skate in these rather than store them, it is the healthiest number on this page. The US retail figure in circulation is $120, which is standard for a Dunk Low Pro and is what both Sneaker Bar Detroit and JustFreshKicks carry. A live US product page for HQ1625-301 could not be located to confirm it directly, and the regional Nike prices that are live do not convert cleanly: 109.99 pounds in the UK, $150 in Canada, $170 in Australia. Treat $120 as reported rather than Nike-confirmed.

There is no confirmed release date, which is why this post no longer carries one. JustFreshKicks put it in summer, with overseas skate shops in June and US shops expected in July. Sneaker Bar Detroit put it in fall 2026. Nike has never published a day. The shoe is out either way. Nike UK has the full size run live at 109.99 pounds and Flatspot has it in stock at 110 pounds, and the resale market is currently the cheaper route.

Source: Justfreshkicks

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The Sneakers Team

The Sneakers Team is the editorial desk behind becausesneakers, founded and edited by Nick Engvall. Nick has spent more than two decades in the sneaker industry. He built the original Eastbay Blog, led the first dedicated sneaker team at Complex, ran the first UGC and seeding programs at Finish Line, was employee number nine at StockX, and served as Senior Director at Stadium Goods. He hosts the Sneaker History podcast, and his first book, Small Luxuries: Sneakers, arrives in October 2026 from Motorbooks. Release details on this site are checked against the brand's own product information before publication, and anything we cannot confirm is labelled rather than stated.

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