The Adidas Adizero Adios Pro 4 and the Adidas Adizero EVO SL belong to the same Adizero line, but they don’t play the same role.
The Adios Pro 4 is the racing shoe, a carbon-rod super shoe built for the marathon. The EVO SL is its training counterpart, with the same racing foam but no plate.
The Adios Pro 4 is the lighter one: 193 g / 6.8 oz versus 224 g / 7.9 oz for the EVO SL. Their dimensions are close, 39 / 33 mm of stack for the Pro 4 against 38.5 / 32 mm for the EVO SL, with a 6 mm drop on both models.
Both ride on Lightstrike Pro, Adidas’s fastest foam. The plate makes the difference: the Adios Pro 4 carries the Energy Rods 2.0, rods that boost propulsion and energy return. The EVO SL goes without them entirely: it is a plateless super shoe, more flexible and more forgiving, that puts the racing foam to work for training.
The Adios Pro 4 is a pure performance shoe: maximum responsiveness, very strong propulsion, made for racing and the marathon. The EVO SL is a little gem of low weight and responsiveness for training: lively and versatile, it strings together workouts and easy runs and is genuinely fun to run in.
Both light, breathable uppers deliver good lockdown at fast paces. The Continental outsole provides excellent road grip in both cases.
Adios Pro 4 or EVO SL: which should you choose?
It all depends on what you need them for, because the two complement each other: the EVO SL for daily training, the Adios Pro 4 for chasing a time in races of any distance.
The EVO SL also works as a racing option, but over shorter formats (10K or the half marathon, for instance): its more limited cushioning may not suit everyone beyond that.
The price gap is significant too: the Adios Pro 4 runs about $100 more. Put simply, for most runners we recommend starting with the EVO SL, and adding the Adios Pro later if you move up to a fast marathon.
