At least for the past few years, Puma’s dominant entries to the football boot world are the Future and Ultra. Puma tries to make it three with the launch of the King Ultimate, the modernised version of its legendary heritage boot. Can it succeed in attracting players to its fold?
King Page Contents:
Recent attempts have been made to make the King adapt to today’s boot consumer tastes and preferences. There’s the King Platinum and King Platinum 21. Safe to say results are quite below average, so Puma not only change the looks and shape of the King, it also introduced something new to its build and composition in order to spike curiosity. Continue reading on to learn more.
2024 Puma King Ultimate Boot Review
| Model | Quality | Pitches | |
|---|---|---|---|
 Puma King Ultimate |  K-BETTER upper with GRIPCONTROL 3D |  |  |
Ultimate
Whenever you see Ultimate in a Puma football boot, it means that that particular pair is the most premium execution of that particular line. Whether it does feel premium to you or not is another story.
Women’s Ultimate
Puma has a dedicated King Ultimate for the female players. The same look but with an adjusted fit geared towards accommodating the nuances of women’s feet.
The Puma King Ultimate has been introduced in 2023 and has received a slight tweak in 2024. The core DNA remains the same though in that the silo has moved on from natural leather to synthetic leather. Ultimately, that’s going to be the question for the modern King. Will it successfully replicate the benefits of the traditional material in a non-animal base setting?
K-BETTER Upper
So K-BETTER here is meant to feel as pliable as natural leather but without the downsides of overstretching and water soaking. Let me say at the onset that K-BETTER on its own is a solid upper material. It is indeed pliable and thin, and can only positively move forward from here once fully broken-in. But I’m afraid it’s just not there, especially when compared to Nike’s FLYTOUCH PLUS, as a substitute for leather. Despite its softness, K-BETTER still has that hint of structure and lacks the pillow-like sensation when the upper is pressed on. I do feel that it does have some tease of a padded ball touch (just a bit since overall K-BETTER is still a thin upper to begin with), but that’s thanks to the thin foam liner backing the main synthetic upper material. I would say that at best K-BETTER makes the King Ultimate a solid synthetic boot comparable to the Teijin-synthetic version of the Mercurial Vapor.
Now if you’re coming from the 2023 King Ultimate, you’ll notice that it does seem to have these rays of ridge texturing on the medial side. And to be honest, I have a bit of a trauma attack as it reminded me of the ill-fated King Platinum 21 and its KINGFORM technology. I’m happy to report that GRIPCONTROL 3D (as the ridge texturing is called) does not offset the pliability of K-BETTER and simply adds multiple friction points to get a bit of a ball grip.
Fit and Feel
I would say that the King Ultimate 2024 has a bias towards narrow-fitting. The reduced stretch of the upper itself combined with the one-piece upper construction only means that you’ll get a boot that wraps very closely on your foot. But comparing the 2024 with the 2023 model, I can feel that Puma has given the King Ultimate a bit more width now around the midfoot, hoping perhaps to attract more players to try out the silo.
The heel has this memory foam-like liner, which to my mind significantly improves the boot’s fit and lockdown feel relative to the 2023 iteration. Tie the laces nicely and you should have no problem with securing your foot inside the boot. It’s not going to be top-of-the-line for lockdown, but it should be somewhat up there. Sizing-wise, I see a growing consensus that half-a-size up is the play here.
Peba Soleplate
King Ultimate is not something you go to when you need ultra-aggressive traction or uber-responsive snapback. I think what you get from the King Ultimate as far as the outsole goes is a no-nonsense, neutral soleplate that sits flat and closely to the ground, and has a functional midfoot rigidity and forefoot flexibility. The conical layout also ensures that you get ease of rotational movements, plus, when you factor in the shortened height of the studs, makes the King Ultimate adaptable to artificial pitches. Sometimes all you need is something simple yet effective, and that’s what the King Ultimate tooling does for you.
Which Puma Silo to Get: King vs Future and Ultra
Perhaps the thing that will standout for the King Ultimate versus the Future and Ultra is that it feels like the middle ground between the latter two, though I would argue it somehow leans more as an alternative to the Ultra because of its synthetic nature. I feel like if you are looking for a synthetic Puma boot void of any tech like a snappy outsole, or if you want something has a relatively solid presence around your feet, then the King Ultimate is the boot to choose. I think simplicity as a synthetic boot (despite the ambitious attempt of replicating natural leather benefits) is the operative phrase for the King. Now versus the Future, lines are more clearly drawn. The Future brings its own level of comfort thanks to the combination of mesh, knit and textile on the upper, and Neymar’s silo arguably has more stud bite than the King because of the bladed studs.
2024 Puma King Pro
| Model | Quality | Pitches | |
|---|---|---|---|
 Puma King Pro |  K-BETTER |  |  >> Get King '24 Pro from Puma |
The first option for a cheaper King is the Pro. Some changes here and there but at least some elements for the Ultimate still make their way down to this price level.
Puma King Match
| Model | Quality | Pitches | |
|---|---|---|---|
 Puma King Match |  Soft Synthetic |  |  >> Get King '24 Match from Puma |
This is where you can certainly feel significant downgrades relative to the Ultimate. Still worth considering if your looking for cheap football boots to get into. Usually bought for children or youth players, even Academy ones.
The Story of the Puma King
Born in 1968, the Puma King has been laced up by several legends of the game, beginning with the likes of Eusebio, Pele, Maradona, and Cruyff. Before the Nike Mercurial and adidas Predator burst into the scene, there was the Puma King that became part of memorable football moments. Watch this Football Boots UK special video about the history of the iconic Puma silo, from its beginnings and heyday up to its period of intense competition from today’s dominant football boot brands.
King Platinum and King Platinum 21
Prior to the King Ultimate, some of the recent attempts to make a contemporary king happened in 2019. The Puma King Platinum was an underrated football boot in that it had that quality K-leather upper but packaged into a thin profile and streamlined fit, just like how speed boots are. In essence, the Platinum had that appeal of being traditionalist but also in-touch with the current on-feet feel of today’s boots. It did get a boost when Neymar switched over to Puma and chose to go with the King Platinum before headlining the Future silo.
Sadly, Puma changed the Platinum for the worst when it released the King Platinum 21 (short for 2021). It was arguably the stiffest of all K-leather boots from all time, and whatever touch benefits the ribbed Kingform technology brought (if there were any), it was all for naught as that rigid leather upper dominated. Much worst was the fact that this naturally led to the Platinum 21 being uncomfortable not just by leather standards but even when compared to the modern synthetic boots.
