2025 Women’s All-Mountain East Skis
2025 Women’s All-Mountain East Recommended Skis
For the advanced woman, the All-Mountain East category is most likely the best place for her to hunt for her one-ski quiver. In our view, the 88mm-93mm waisted ski possesses the optimal surface area and shape to deliver adequate flotation in broken snow without creating a ski so wide that tipping it on hard snow potentially puts the knee joint at risk. The more petite the person, the more this prescription pertains.
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When we factor in the terrain versatility the archetypical All-Mountain East provides, we’re led to the conclusion that for many female skiers, East or West, these skis bring the best bundle of behaviors to the all-terrain party. Many American women must agree, for they made Blizzard’s Black Pearl 88 the best-selling model four straight years. The Pearl’s success no doubt inspired the competition to up its game, resulting in a market over-stuffed with options.
The Women’s All-Mountain East genre is a crossroads category, where the DNA of skinny Frontside models mingles with that of the skinniest members of an off-trail tribe. For a category that professes to present “50/50” models that are equally at home on piste or off, the WAME is almost entirely comprised of skis descended from a fatter archetype.
Because the Women’s All-Mountain East category is so popular, brands want to load it up with as many models as they can. There are often two or three tiers of the retail price spectrum represented, so women have more value-priced options.
In the final analysis, it’s the adaptability to a broad palette of conditions that makes the All-Mountain East genre the home of do-it-all ski for women. Thanks to their shape and fairly svelte mid-section, they move edge to edge almost as swiftly as a Frontside model, and they’re plenty nimble enough to snake through bumps or slip through trees. Of course, they can’t float in freshies the same way a fatter ski can, but how many runs do you get in uncut snow, even on snow days? They have as much flotation for the average woman as a 98mm-waisted ski has for a man, which is sufficient in all but the most luscious, bottomless conditions.
The 2025 Women’s All-Mountain East Field
This has been an important year for model turnover in this vital genre, if for no other reason than the model that has sold more than any other, men’s or women’s, in the last ten years is getting new guts. Blizzard’s iconic Black Pearl 88 is switching to a variation of the Fluxform design introduced last year in the Sheeva series. It doesn’t have as much Titanal in its construction as the unisex Anomaly 88 that shares its shape, but where and how Titanal has been deployed has once again raised the performance ceiling for what has probably been the best-selling women’s ski of all time. Also falling within the boundaries of the All-Mountain East category is the new Black Pearl 94, built identically to the 88 but inherently burlier by dint of its wider dimensions.
On par with the commercial importance of the new Black Pearls is a parallel upgrade in the Santa Ana collection of sister brand Nordica. As is the case with the Blizzards, the reincarnated Santa Ana 87 and 92 use less metal than their unisex counterparts, so they’re stout enough to subdue crud but light enough to float on freshies. Also using a measured amount of metal to telling effect is the small-batch producer Liberty, whose Horizon 92 behaves like a powerful carver on groomers and a crud-cruncher off trail.
Power Picks: Pandering to the Proficient
If you would self-classify as advanced, you needn’t look any further for your next daily driver, for it’s almost certainly among our Power Picks. This is the sub-genre where you get it all: expert-level edging power, enough width to pummel your way through off-piste “powder,” and a sweet spot that feels like home.
It’s not an accident that the best-selling ski in the specialty channel over the last decade has been the 88mm-waisted Black Pearl 88: it has the right qualifications for the job of all-terrain, one-ski quiver. The Pearl 88 has inspired a legion of competitors aspiring to the same level of success; if there’s a model out there that can dethrone it, it’s probably among the quintet of pretenders we’ve nominated as our other Power Picks.
Finesse Favorites: The Friendly Fraternity
The raison d’etre of the entire All-Mountain East category – by far the most popular slice of the women’s market – is to make off-trail skiing more accessible without compromising on-trail competence. Most women will begin their ski adventure on a rental ski or hand-me-down; when they’re ready to get their first pair of new skis, this is the niche where they’ll find their best options.
On-hill, you’d never know they were capable of coddling the less-than-expert, for they instantly exhibit a performance range that will advance the intermediate skier a long way towards total all-terrain proficiency.