First of all the box

Checking the shoe box and the box label is always the first thing to do… ZLIV box label should look similar to the ones below [ZOOM LEBRON IV]. There are also two examples of how should the correct shoe box look like.

The ZLIV exclusive releases come with an unique shoe bag instead of a regular LeBron IV shoe box. There are only 4 different colorways of the bag – Birthday, All-Star, New York, China:

Below there are examples of a fake box and the box label:

It says [NIKE ZOOM LEBRON IV]. This is incorrect because I have never seen the NIKE prefix in the name of any LeBron shoe. for example it is always… [AIR ZOOM GENERATION] or [ZOOM LEBRON II] or [ZOOM LEBRON II LOW]. Remember no NIKE prefix!

LRJ sign on the toebox

Almost every fake LeBron IV shoe I’ve seen has wrong LRJ logo on the front of the shoe. This is a very good rule how to spot a fake (at least for now – mostly the first colorway). Check below:

CORRECT:	FAKE:

The insoles – L23

Here is another good rule… The logo on the insoles. It should be a classic LJ23 logo which looks like this:

White/Navy, White/Navy Sample:	Black/Anthracite:
Remix:	China Exclusive:

We haven’t seen any fakes with the correct logo so far… but then again it is hard to get a photo containing this particular angle. Here are 2 examples of the fake logos:

Low quality

Nike Zoom LeBron IV due to all the technology packed into it the shoe is very hard to counterfeit. For that reason one of the things you can turn your attention to is the overall quality of the shoe. Original shoe looks amazing like in all of our photos at this gallery here, for example:

The IVs definitely don’t look like this:

Inside labels

Every different colorway of the LBJ4s has a unique inside label.

	Black/White/Red: [“NEVER FORGET TO HEAR THE VOICE OF THE ATHLETE” P.H. KNIGHT]
	Black/Anthracite: [OCTOBER 6TH 2004] Birthday of LeBron’s first son
	Navy/White/Gold: [MAY 21ST 2003] Date King James signed up with Nike
	China Exclusive: [“NEVER FORGET TO HEAR THE VOICE OF THE ATHLETE” P.H. KNIGHT] + [xxxx of 4500] – unique pair number
	NYC Exclusive: [“YOU HAVEN’T MADE IT UNTIL YOU MAKE IT IN NYC” 11.13.06]:
	Birthday: Cake
	All-Star: Star
	Black/Crimson: Four Hourseman
	White/Silver: [The FAMILY]
	Remix: [“NEVER FORGET TO HEAR THE VOICE OF THE ATHLETE” P.H. KNIGHT]

See all the labels: Label Dictionary.

Fake colorways

This website provides photos of ALMOST every Nike LeBron colorway there is! For like 99% if it’s not in our listing pretty much it doesn’t exist. Of course we can’t say we are 100 percent sure because we believe they are some PEs or sample that nobody have seen. But as long as this is a General Release shoe (priced $100-250) you can be certain that it is on our list. Here are some photos of fake colorways that we’ve found so far:

Update – 1/1/08

Fake NYCs

Usually fakes are done long before the actual product hits the stores. However, there are some cases where it’s the other way around. Fake merchandise is “designed” based on the first samples and past releases implementing the popular colorways. When the real manufacturer, in this case Nike, does something unexpected and one of a kind, the fakers are trying to keep up with them, cause for them it’s just another chance to make money. That’s why instead of the usual, early fakes there exist fake versions of selected PEs and exclusives. This happens very rarely, but you need to be prepared. Below you will find several pics of the fake Zoom LeBron IV NYC Edition. There are very easy to spot cause the original with its Graffiti pattern is very hard to copy. Fakes are very sloppy.