The shoes have gone by a variety of names, depending on geography, and changing over the decades. The term "sneakers" is most commonly used in the Northeastern United States, South Florida and Central Florida, parts of Canada and New Zealand.

The British English equivalent of "sneaker" in its modern form is "trainer". In some urban areas in the United States, the slang for sneakers is kicks. Other terms include training shoes or trainers (Britain), sandshoes, gym boots or joggers (Geordie English in the UK and Australian English), running shoes, runners or gutties (Canada, Australia and Scotland), daps in Wales, runners in Hiberno-English, sneakers (North America, New Zealand and Australia), tennis shoes (North American and Australia), gym shoes, tennies, sports shoes, sneaks, takkies (South Africa[4] and Hiberno-English), rubber shoes (Philippine English), canvas shoes (Nigeria) and sportex (Greece)