--- title: These Optical illusion Sneakers Launched an Internet Debate description: The internet can't decide if these shoes are teal and gray or pink and white, bringing back memories of the Dress debacle. canonical: https://time.com/4979943/sneakers-optical-illusion/ author: Raisa Bruner article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-10-12T17:38:11.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:47:57.837Z og:title: The Internet Can't Stop Debating the Color of These Sneakers og:description: Are they teal and gray, or pink and white? og:url: https://time.com/4979943/sneakers-optical-illusion/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: TIME og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Internet Can't Stop Debating the Color of These Sneakers twitter:description: Are they teal and gray, or pink and white? twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- # The Internet Can't Agree on What Color These Sneakers Are and It's Freaking Everyone Out > Sponsored content. 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Well, this week we have “The Shoe.” It’s actually a lace-up sneaker — and, in the tradition of all of our favorite viral optical illusions, its color combination is very much up for debate. There’s no doubt that the lighting on the image that’s circulating online is the real culprit here. While many are going by face value — teal and gray! — others are arguing that the true hue must be pink and white. > [](https://twitter.com/TFILDOLANS/status/918142807050805248) As it turns out, the original is indeed pink and white, at least one Twitter user contends. But that isn’t stopping people from trying to wrap their brains around this new optical illusion. > [](https://twitter.com/staruins/status/918193149356281856) > [](https://twitter.com/benjaunceyy/status/918200357137903617) Some still weren’t convinced. But there’s more evidence. > [](https://twitter.com/dolansmalik/status/918234911290613760) At least it doesn’t look like this is about to break the internet in the way that the (definitely white and gold) Dress [did back in 2015\. ](http://time.com/4238688/the-dress-1-year-anniversary-white-gold-blue-black/) ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4979943/sneakers-optical-illusion/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4979943/sneakers-optical-illusion/"},"headline":"The Internet Can't Agree on What Color These Sneakers Are and It's Freaking Everyone Out","datePublished":"2017-10-12T17:38:11.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:47:57.837Z","description":"The internet can't decide if these shoes are teal and gray or pink and white, bringing back memories of the Dress debacle.","url":"https://time.com/4979943/sneakers-optical-illusion/","keywords":["Newsfeed","viral","fashion"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Raisa Bruner","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/raisa-bruner/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4979943/sneakers-optical-illusion/","name":"The Internet Can't Agree on What Color These Sneakers Are and It's Freaking Everyone Out"}}]}] ```