Choking is the most common reason a shoe gets recalled in the United States. In our archive of 103 footwear recalls, 42 are filed under choking, well ahead of falls (27) and impact injuries (12). Every one of the 42 involves children’s footwear, and together they make up 42 of the 60 children’s recalls we track. The pattern is simple and has barely changed since 1993: a small decorative or functional part comes loose, and a baby or toddler puts it in their mouth.
This guide looks at which parts came off, what the federal small parts test measures, and why that test does not map neatly onto shoes. The full list sits on our choking hazard page.
The newest case, Cat & Jack sandals in 2026
On July 16, 2026, Target recalled about 211,000 pairs of Cat & Jack children’s sandals (recall 26-629). The notice describes tan sandals with two raffia straps, gold buckles and plastic pearls, sold in sizes 5T through 12T. The hazard, in CPSC’s words: “The sandals’ decorative pearls can fall off, posing a risk of serious injury or death from a choking hazard.”
Target had received 23 reports of pearls falling off, and no injuries had been reported. The sandals were sold at Target stores and on target.com from January 2026 through May 2026 for about $20, and were made in Cambodia. The remedy is a full refund, by returning the pair to any store or by mail with a prepaid label. By units it is the fifth-largest choking recall in our archive. The details and the official link are on our Cat & Jack sandals recall page.
Two things stand out. The pairs were on sale for only five months before the recall, which is typical: across the 34 choking notices that give both a start and end month, the median sale window is five months. And this is the fourth Cat & Jack choking recall in our archive, after two unicorn-horn boots in 2019 and a toggle on toddler boots in 2020.
What came off
We read the hazard and description text of the 37 choking recalls that have full structured notices (the other five are 1990s press releases). Here is what detached, grouped by part.
| Part that came off | Recalls | Examples from the notices |
|---|---|---|
| Flowers and jewels | 7 | Gymboree baby sandals (2005), Stride Rite metal flower (2013) |
| Toggles on laces or drawcords | 4 | L.L. Bean slippers (2000), Cat & Jack boots (2020) |
| Rivets on straps or handles | 4 | Western Chief rain boots (2020), Birkenstock kids’ sandals (2021) |
| Pom-poms and antenna balls | 3 | Elf booties (2016), bumble bee slipper socks (2011) |
| Unicorn horns | 2 | Cat & Jack “Chiara” and “Lilia” boots (2019) |
| Decorative wheels | 2 | Buster Brown “CARS” clogs (2009, twice) |
| Metal eyelets | 2 | Payless toddler sneakers (2004), Trimfoot soft soles (2014) |
| Logo tags and heel tabs | 2 | Reebok toddler shoes, Nike Get-Go (both 2004) |
| Rubber pieces on the sole | 2 | Clarks first shoes (2009), Zutano booties (2017) |
| One each | 9 | pearls, buckle, snap, zipper tab, butterfly wings, stuffing and rattle, a top strap, Tweety sandal parts, coin battery |
Decoration, not structure, drives most of these. Flowers, jewels, pearls, horns, pom-poms, wings and fake wheels add up to 16 of the 37. The functional parts that failed tend to be small hardware: a snap on a See Kai Run boot, a metal zipper tab on L.L. Bean faux-shearling booties, plastic rivets on clogs.
The one odd entry is the 2026 Raychy light-up sneaker, which sits in the choking group because of an ingestion risk. Its notice is about lithium coin batteries that children could reach, and it cites the federal battery standard, not a loose decoration.
How close the near misses came
None of the 37 structured notices records an injury. That does not mean nothing happened. Thirteen of them describe a child mouthing, swallowing or starting to choke on the part. A few, quoted from the notices:
- 2002, Good Lad infant garments and sandals: “A child swallowed a decorative ladybug and two others began to choke on decorative flowers.”
- 2011, Atico holiday rattle baby slippers sold at Walgreens: a 7-month-old “was found beginning to turn blue with the slippers’ stuffing in its mouth.” The baby’s father removed it.
- 2017, Zutano Cozie booties: two reports of the detached rubber “Z” grips found in infants’ mouths.
- 2020, Western Chief light-up rain boots: 115 reports of handles and rivets detaching, and 2 reports of children placing rivets in their mouths.
The federal small parts rule
The rule most people mean by “small parts” is 16 CFR 1500.18(a)(9), which bans any toy or other article intended for children under 3 that presents a choking, aspiration or ingestion hazard because of small parts, as determined by part 1501. Part 1501 supplies the test.
The test uses a small parts cylinder. CPSC described it in its 1978 proposal as “a truncated cylinder measuring 1-1/4 inches in diameter by 2-1/4 inches in depth,” which works out to roughly 32 by 57 mm. CPSC’s business guidance says the cylinder approximates “the size of the fully expanded throat of a child under three years old.” The binding drawing is Figure 1 in 16 CFR 1501.4, and the rule says the English (inch) dimensions control.
The procedure in 16 CFR 1501.4(b) has two steps:
- Place the article, “without compressing it,” into the cylinder. If it fits entirely inside “in any orientation,” it fails.
- If it does not fit, run the use and abuse tests in 16 CFR 1500.51 and 1500.52, minus the bite tests. Any piece that breaks off goes into the cylinder one at a time. Paper, fabric, yarn, fuzz, elastic and string are excluded from this step.
Age is set by the product, not the household. Under 1501.2, what counts is the maker’s stated intent if reasonable, how the article is advertised and marketed, and whether it is commonly recognized as meant for children under 3. Many of the recalled shoes were plainly in that range: infant sizes 0 to 12 months, “prewalk” sizes, or, in Birkenstock’s 2021 notice, “sizes 24-28 for children up to age 3.”
Why shoes are a special case
Here is the part competing pages leave out. The exemption list in 16 CFR 1501.3 includes “(d) Children’s clothing and accessories, such as shoe lace holders and buttons.” So the small parts ban, as written, carves out clothing and accessories, and it names a shoe part as its example.
The recall notices reflect that. Not one of the 37 structured choking notices says the shoe violated the small parts rule. Each one says a part “can detach” or “can fall off,” “posing a choking hazard.” Compare the lead recalls in our archive, whose titles say “Violation of Federal Lead Content Ban” outright (see our guide on lead limits for children’s shoes). We are describing what the notices say, not giving a legal reading. For a parent, the cylinder is still a useful sense of scale. A loose pearl, snap or toggle that would slide into a tube 1-1/4 inches across is in the size range the toy rule treats as a choking risk for children under 3.
Patterns by decade and by store
Choking share has fallen as other hazards appeared in the record, but it has never gone away.
| Decade | Footwear recalls | Choking recalls |
|---|---|---|
| 1990s | 9 | 5 |
| 2000s | 40 | 19 |
| 2010s | 38 | 13 |
| 2020s (to October 2026) | 16 | 5 |
The 1990s cases already show the same failure: balloons on Islander sandals (1993), a Keds heel label (1993), buckles on Gerber-licensed sandals (1995), and zip-up children’s sneakers from Payless and Reebok (1998 and 1999). The 2000s peak includes the largest choking recall we hold, about 1.4 million pairs of Buster Brown & Co. clogs in 2009 whose decorative car wheels could detach. Across the 37 structured notices, the total comes to about 3.96 million units.
By seller, Target appears most often: its stores sold 7 of the 37, counting Target’s own brands, Western Chief boots sold only at Target, and the Buster Brown clogs. Payless ShoeSource was the recalling firm four times between 1998 and 2007. Meijer stores sold four, Nordstrom and L.L. Bean two each. Of the 35 notices that name a country of manufacture, 30 say China. The trends page charts recalls by year and country for all footwear.
Checking a pair you already own
Choking notices pin down the exact pairs with numbers. Gymboree’s flower sandals were identified by a SKU on the price tag, Payless’s toddler sneakers by a five-digit number on the underside of the tongue, Nike’s Get-Go shoes by a six-digit number on an inside label. Search our children’s footwear recalls by brand first, then match the numbers in the notice. The steps for that are in checking a shoe recall. If a decoration on a toddler’s shoe has come loose and the shoe is not on any list, you can still tell the seller and file a report on SaferProducts.gov, the federal database CPSC runs.