The past couple of years have been significant for sneakerheads and sneaker culture in general, with the rise in limited edition versions and rare releases happening more often than ever. Riding the crest of that wave is Nike, whose SNKRS app provides an insider shortcut for getting your hands on the company's more exclusive and elusive releases. 

The app has been limited to iOS users until now though, as Nike is bringing the SNKRS app to Android. The release of the app is built to coincide with the NBA's All-Star weekend (12-15 Feb), which was the case when Nike did so for the iOS version. 

As Engadget points out, the overall success of the app is hard to gauge, as most sneakerheads favour physical stores over online retailers. It's even more so for us in South Africa, as the SNKRS app only caters to those in the US and Canada. Much of the problem is resellers, who are often the first to purchase rare sneakers through the aid of bots, snapping up sneakers before normal human beings can. As such, the reseller market is making it all the harder for everyday sneakerheads to get their hands on highly coveted pieces of footwear. 

Whether or not SNKRS will help Nike secure its position in its native US remains to be seen, especially as Kanye West's Adidas collaborations have been highly sought after, and Under Armour recently signing every MVP for all the major American sports. To that end, Nike has also detailed its SNKRS XPRESS experience, which will have multiple pop-up sneaker stores across the US.