Is Under Urmour gearing up for something big?

For years, Under Armour has been synonymous with hyper-muscled athletes and technical apparel. A brand built for performance, yes, but visually pigeonholed. However, something is changing. In recent months, the American brand has begun to flirt slyly with creatives, collectives and brands that speak another language, further away from dumbbells.

The cultural shift is accompanied by a progressive repositioning strategy, in a context that demands brand precision, not forgetting that its direct competition with Nike and adidas forces it to seek new cultural niches with which to have a real impact.

The first serious attempt to make a splash came with Balenciaga. Las year, the luxury fashion house ropped its capsule with Under Armour without much explanation. Like someone dropping a hint. Demna absorbed the UA logo without dissonance: it worked. It was the first big step for a brand that needed to enter the fashion conversation without seeming desperate. The gesture was saying: “yes, we can be part of the system, but in our own way”.

The second came with Equipo FC, the Spanish creative collective that turned the UA tracksuit into an object of desire for battle. This was the basis of the capsule concept: “Wear your Armour, for any battle”. No big campaigns or ambassadors, just grainy photos, good casting and an aesthetic that mixed the hooligan aesthetics of the periphery with medieval and 2000s rave accents.

And the key moment, which is the one that’s given even more hints that Under Armour is baking things up, is his cameo on Playboi Carti. The rapper was spotted at one of his last concerts wearing a beanie from the collaboration between UA and Opium, his collective.

These types of collaborations work because they do not require a drastic transformation of the parent brand, but rather an aesthetic bifurcation that speaks to new audiences without alienating the usual ones. On a business level, this approach makes sense: collaborations with collectives like Equipo FC or labels like Opium are low cost and high cultural return. They activate loyal niches, increase organic presence in networks and do not require altering the main production chain. In addition, they feed a story that reinforces online sales and positions the brand in the conversation without the need for mega-investments in advertising.

Perhaps we are seeing the birth of a “cult” brand. A label that is starting to play with less obvious and more finished codes. And if they continue down this path, Under Armour may end up being the most strangely relevant brand of 2025.