Portugal’s footwear industry exports more than 90% of what it produces to around 170 countries.
What has changed is how those shoes are being made.
Over the past decade, the sector has invested more than €600 million in automation, robotics and sustainability, helping Portuguese manufacturers move further into premium and luxury production.
That is a useful example of a broader change in Portuguese industry.
For many years, Portugal competed partly through lower production costs than countries further north in Europe.
That advantage still matters, but it is becoming less important on its own. There will always be markets where labour is cheaper.
Portuguese companies increasingly have to compete on something else: engineering, flexibility, production quality and the ability to adapt quickly.
The export data show part of that shift. Portugal sold €4.08 billion of high-technology goods abroad in 2025, a new record.
Telecommunications still account for most of those exports, while aerospace sales increased 49.1% during the year.
The transition is far from complete. Portugal still trails the EU average in several measures of business investment, patents and medium- and high-tech exports.
Productivity also remains one of the country’s weaker points.
But competing successfully does not require Portugal to become the cheapest manufacturer in Europe again.
A factory using robotics to produce footwear for international luxury brands and a company exporting aerospace equipment are very different businesses.
They depend increasingly on the same things: technical knowledge, specialised workers and the ability to produce something that is difficult to replace purely on price.
“Made in Portugal” still tells us where something was produced.
Increasingly, it also tells us more about how.
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