Material Matters: Tubular Air Has Gone From Forgotten to Fresh

March 26 is a well established holiday in sneaker culture, as it celebrates Nike’s franchise. The date commemorates when the first Swoosh shoe with visible Air, the , hit the market in 1987 and began bugging out eyeballs everywhere with its inside look into the cushioning system. Each year, Nike drops an exciting new Air Max model and/or classic big-bubbled retro in March, and 2025’s headliner is the , the latest evolution in Air Max Dn technology. But ‘Dynamic’ Air didn’t just pop up out of nowhere – it’s actually a resurrected version of Tubular Air, a forgotten Air Max iteration from 2001. In this edition of Material Matters, we’ll explore the history of Tubular Air, first tracing it back to its obscure origins and then seeing how it’s been given new life with the Air Max Dn franchise.

Totally Tubular!

Let’s put it this way, among the landmark evolutions of Nike Air Max, Tubular Air isn’t one of them. In fact, Nike totally omits Tubular Air in most of their own retrospects on the history of their most iconic cushioning system. It was there for about two years from 2001 to 2002, and then *poof!* Gone. Never to be heard from again. That is, until Nike decided to resurrect the tubular tech, revamping it with the , 2024’s Air Max month release.

Because there’s so little information out there about Tubular Air, its exact concept and technical details are lost in the deflated bubbles of time. But Tubular Air is a variant of , the Air Max tech that debuted in 1998 with the classic . The concept behind Tuned Air was to create strategic Air cushioning for targeted impact absorption and stability in different parts of the heel, which was achieved by adding with hemispheres within the Air unit in positions. Tubular Air did away with these hemispheres within the Air bags, instead shaping the Air bag around both the foam in the midsole and rubber of the outsole to create the desired stability. This strategic design resulted in tube-like shapes for the Air Max bubble that are exposed at the edges of the shoe in bulbous round shapes that gave Tubular Air its signature look.

Tube Air debuted in the Air Max 2001, the year’s flagship Air Max running shoe, as well as a takedown version called the Air Max Elite R. Tube Air materialised again in the Air Max 2002, which featured an expanded amount of tube pods all the way to the midfoot of the shoe (with a standard visible Air unit in the forefoot). Another notable model to feature the tech was the Air Max P-Phaze basketball shoe, a wild design that kind of looks as if an Air Max runner and the had a baby born in the early 2000s.

It’s worth noting that none of these models have any kind of ‘Tubular Air’ branding present on them, which is another clue that the tech was just a slight variation on Tuned Air, not an entirely new silo in the Air Max lineage. Further evidence to back up that theory is the crazy-looking Air Max Plus V from 2002, which certainly appears to have Tubular Air but is branded with Tuned Air logos.

From all accounts, Tubular Air wasn’t very flexible nor responsive, which explains why the tech was so short lived despite looking pretty damn cool. Tuned and Tubular Air were both quickly phased out as Air Max technology continued to evolve with its next major step – 360-degree Air with no foam around it, which debuted in 2006 with the . Tuned Air models have maintained popularity as retros, like the beloved Air Max Plus and iridescent from 1999, but none of the few Tubular Air models have ever returned from the Nike vaults, perhaps forever doomed to be just a small, overlooked footnote in the history of Air.

Tubular Air Gets a ‘Dynamic’ Refresh

The history of Tubular Air may be a bit foggy, but the considered design and technology behind Dynamic Air Max is well documented and clearly defined. It debuted in 2024’s , a lifestyle sneaker designed with maximum comfort in mind. Taking the concept of Tubular Air and making it more tube-like than ever, the design of the Air Max Dn’s air unit consists of four tubes, with the two rear tubes tuned to a higher pressure than the front two, which helps propel the foot forward from heel strike to toe-off. ‘That’s the “dynamic motion” in Dn – that the Air unit can interact with your foot pushing down on it and help fluidly transition you forward,’ said Reggie Hunter, a product director on the Dynamic Air team. ‘Your body is the load that forces this response out of the bag.’

For the new Air Max Dn8, Nike increased the Dn Air units and put them across the full length of the sole for an even more fluid heel-to-toe responsiveness. The Dn8’s design also features two air units, but this time with eight tubes to create a sustained, pressurised flow from heel to forefoot for a sensation that’s like walking on clouds – if clouds could also nudge you forward with each step. The Dn8’s air chambers are also closer to the ground than those in the Air Max Dn, which allows the chambers to ‘more effectively compress and be way more flexible, delivering a much bouncier, springier sensation that channels a Nike performance footwear approach into a shoe you want to wear every day,’ said Nike Lead Designer for Men’s Sportswear Jonathan Kosenick.

Tubular Air is more significant for its nostalgic Y2K-era aesthetics than any major advancements in Air Max technology, but it did provide the all-important inspiration for the latest exciting new evolution of Air. The tubes are bigger and better than ever in the new Air Max Dn franchise, and they’re ready to propel us into the future for whatever Nike’s Air Max innovators can cook up next. In the meantime, we’ll all be enjoying the ride.

For more Air Max, our Breaking Down the Differences: 2020 vs 2025 Nike Air Max 95 ‘Neon’!