The Edmonton Oilers are one of the most remarkably consistent-looking teams in North American professional sports. Apart from color changes, their primary logo has remained the same for the team’s entire existence, even going back to their time in the World Hockey Association.
Still, that doesn’t mean we have nothing to talk about — the Oilers have a ton of alternates, and enough color changes to make your head spin.
This is part two of a two-part series asking Uni Watch readers what their favorite uniform set is from the two Stanley Cup Finals teams. You can find the Florida Panthers’ entry here. For the record, I’m only going to talk about the Oilers’ NHL uniforms — no WHA here.
1979-1996
While their NOB and number font varied in their very early NHL seasons, the Oilers spent the entirety of their dynasty wearing V-necked sweaters with large, blue-white-orange-white-blue torso and sleeve stripes at home, inverted on the road. A blue-and-orange shoulder yoke at home and orange-and-white yoke on the road completes the jersey.
The team initially had pants with a large orange stripe down the side — the stripe was dropped for the 1995-96 season, the final in this colorway.
1996-2007
The Oilers had their first real uni redesign in 1996. They darkened their royal blue and orange to navy and bronze, and added very thin red outlines to the bronze torso and sleeve stripes on the home and road jerseys. The first season of this look kept the shoulder yoke on the home whites before dropping it in 1997. The Oilers introduced a shoulder patch, an art deco-esque depiction of an oil worker pulling a lever that looks like a hockey stick.
The Oilers introduced their first ever alternate jersey, designed by artist Todd McFarlane, in 2001. The navy blue jersey’s primary crest depicts an oil drop encased in a metal gear. The five rivets around the drop represent the club’s five Stanley Cups. A new shoulder logo is introduced on this jersey, as well as a new number and NOB font. Silver-white-silver sleeve stripes and a silver-white torso stripe complete the look. It all screams early 2000s, and was retired following the introduction of the Reebok Edge template.
2008-2011
Like so many other teams, upon the introduction of the Reebok Edge template, the Oilers fell victim to some of the worst design trends caused by it. Keeping the same color scheme, their new home and road uniforms have the apron-string piping. The truncated sleeve stripes are the familiar white-navy-bronze-navy-white design at home (bronze bordered by extremely thin red), but on the road the there’s a huge bronze stripe with smaller navy and white stripes above it. They eliminated the shoulder patches.
After the reintroduction of alternate jerseys in 2009, the Oilers brought back their dynasty look. Small wonder which jersey fans wanted to buy.
2011-2017
The Oilers promoted the alternate look to full-time and introduced a (largely) matching road counterpart, though the blue on the road jersey looks darker than the blue at home. For the first season of the new look, the team does retain the previous set’s home uniform as an alternate before dropping it.
The team introduced an orange alternate jersey in 2015, which also featured oddly-placed TV numbers like the ones on the first WHA jerseys. The design proved so popular that the Oilers designated it as their primary home jersey for the 2016-17 season, their final at Edmonton Coliseum, and it was used in the 2016 Heritage Classic, an event that usually has special uniforms.
2017-2022
The Oilers move back to navy blue as they move into their new arena, and drop the royal blue unis entirely apart from four games in the 2018-19 season, the team’s 40th in the NHL. In 2019, the Oilers introduce a new navy alternate, completely bereft of white elements (even on the crest). It’s an eyesore, in my opinion.
2022-present
The royal blue comes back, as does their traditional home blue uniform. The navy alternate is retained through the 2023-24 season. It took a while, but the Oilers finally look like the Oilers again.
Heritage Classic and Reverse Retro
2003 Heritage Classic
The Oilers did bring back royal blue and orange for one game in their navy-and-bronze era — the 2003 Heritage Classic at Edmonton’s Commonwealth Stadium. The design is rather plain compared to future outdoor games, and the only embellishment is the NHL Vintage patch worn by both the Oilers and the Montreal Canadiens.
As stated above, the Oilers didn’t design a special uniform for the 2016 Heritage Classic, instead wearing their uber-popular alternates with the Heritage Classic patch added to the right sleeve. Cam Talbot wore a toque during the game though!
2021 Reverse Retro
It’s the Oilers’ standard away uni, with orange replacing blue and blue replacing orange. The whole point of Reverse Retro, if you will.
It was always odd to me that the Oilers didn’t lean fully into the orange during their orange era. This uni looks great! Why stick with the blue when you want to be an orange team?
2022-23 Reverse Retro
The Oilers brought back the Todd McFarlane alternates from 2001-07, but introduced orange, a welcome update to the drab originals.
2023 Heritage Classic
The Oilers diverged from past Heritage Classic designs by adopting a look inspired by the Edmonton Mercurys. The uni number in the oil drop on the main crest is a nice touch, but I’m not sure how I feel about the khaki-colored pants and gloves.
And that’s all! I think I’m partial to the current/original Oilers set. It’s just so iconic. But what do I now — share your thoughts down below!
One more thing…
Father’s Day is next Sunday, June 15. Uni Watch has proudly shared photos of Dads in uniform for over a decade now, a tradition started by Phil Hecken, continued by Jim Vilk, and now I’m taking up the mantle.
This is always a very special day, and we’d love for as many readers as possible to participate — especially those of you who haven’t done so before. A few of you have reached out to Phil saying “I’ve run out of photos of my Dad” (from years past), so if you want to resubmit a photo used before, please do so!
To take part in this annual tradition, select one photo of your father (or grandfather or uncle) in uniform (it can be sports, military, work — as long as it’s a uniform) along with a short description of 100 words or less. Then email the photo — again, only one, please — and text to anthonyemerson94@gmail.com with the subject line “Uni Watch Father’s Day 2025” by Thursday, JUNE 12, 11:59 PM Eastern. I’ll run all of the submissions on Father’s Day. Thanks!
No ifs ands or buts about it its 1979 – 1996 the Gretzky and Mes era. Honorable mention the throwback orange uniforms with the TV numbers in the yokes., Nothing else is deemed worthy.
Agreed about the 1980s look. Just a remarkably clean and consistent uniform set, one of the best in NHL history. The current shade of Royal seems brighter to me, and that’s an improvement. The current set is an OK second-best option among the team’s various uniforms, and the Oilers definitely ought to have an orange alt option to wear a few games each season.
Current set is the best. Should bring back 2015 orange uni as an alternate again.
Oilers logo and colours origin appears to be like uniform advertising before the current state of ads on uniforms. Trying to woo Gulf executives:
link
Gretzky unis, all day, every day.
They darkened their royal blue and orange to navy and bronze
Copper. It was copper. And it wouldn’t have been horrible if copper had stayed in the color set, but limited to the color of the oil drop.
This is a slam dunk. The Gretzky and Messier uniforms, all day, every day. I’ve always loved the big, flaring stripe on the breezers and the way the designer thought, “Needs more orange to visually balance the yoke— okay, we’ll add it to the cuffs.”
While the Gretzky/Mess unis are great and classic, I actually think their current unis may be their best. And I absolutely LOVED the RR with the orange breezers. Everything between pales, although I did like the orange sweater worn between 2011-2017.
Current set all the way. If they wore those and a few times a year either orange alternate and the 2021 Reverse Retro = perfection.
Agree completely.
The shoulder patch for the 1996-2007 set is in a style which has been dubbed Factory Pomo. It was a style that was born out of the House Music movement of the 1980’s and it’s characterized by industrial style imagery influenced by art deco and modernism, tall typography, spikes and inverted colours. The NBA in particular went hard in on the style with the Toronto Raptors and the aborted 1994 rebrand of the Los Angeles Clippers, which is probably peak Factory Pomo in sports.
The 1996-2007 set was good, but the best set for the Oilers has to be either the dynasty one or the current set.
Oh shit! I forgot about that weird gold on the ‘96-‘07’s. That’s actually a pretty flawless uni. I will gladly be the only one voting for it.
The only Oilers uniform I really like is that one for the 2023 Heritage Classic.
Never ever liked the WAY-too-70s regular logo.
Wouldn’t mind seeing that oil worker pulling the hockey stick on the front of their sweaters. Put that on the Gretzky-era or current unis and you’re talking close to perfection.
Current set is perfect. With a melancholy nod to the bronze-and-midnight-blue worn during 2006’s near miss.
And burn, burn with fire the awful apron strings of 2008-2011.
Current set but bring back the orange alt and that’s perfect. I think they are bringing back the orange alt too, so there ya go. Just keep those 3 forever.
Unpopular opinion, but I have always been a fan of them using orange as a primary, and pairing it with navy trim rather than royal (2017-2022). Blue with orange trim makes them way too similar to the Islanders. But I totally understand the history behind their royal blue with orange classic look. Either way both look great, but for my tastes, the royal blue is just too derivative of the Islanders who were in the NHL first.
I love the 2023 Heritage Classic design as an alternate uniform for them.
There’s a large part of me that wishes that they either kept those as the primary uniforms or created a road version of the no white navy and orange set for the McDavid era. Keep the Gretzky era uniforms for Gretzky, the gold and navy for that 06 team, and then Orange and Navy for McDavid.
Granted, I also very much link players to uniforms. With the Pens, their current set makes me think of the Lemieux days, while the Vegas gold pops into my head when I think of Crosby. I think the Caps need a redesign the most in the league, but I want it to wait until Ovi retires. He is that uniform set. Also the league should require him to rock the mirrored visor for his last game
I’m all about the 2011-17 orange with blue yoke and stripes, but the 2023 Heritage Classics are pretty sweet, too. I’d say the Oilers are among the best-uniformed NHL teams in recent history.
For the Father’s Day salute, don’t forget about the ones that were missed from last year because of the wrong e-mail address was posted for submissions. Thank you.
The best is any uniform without any ad.
I wonder if that shoulder patch from 1996-2007 was inspired by the Lewis Wickes Hines 1921 photo “Powerhouse”.
link.
“…though the blue on the road jersey looks darker than the blue at home.”
I think this is an optical illusion. Many NHL teams have a single set of breezers for their standard home and road uniforms (they may have alternative set if they have specialty jerseys that aren’t in their primary colors – like Toronto and Tampa’s black breezers for their black jerseys).
That was the case for these Oilers jerseys. The had the same set of breezers for their home and road jerseys. The blue next to the white makes the blue appear lighter – whereas the blue next to the orange makes it look darker. They are wearing the same breezers in both photos. As seen here: link
As far as the khaki colored gloves and breezers, they were designed to replicate the era when most teams wore only the jersey (or in this case and actual sweater had team colors. It fits with the look they were going for. Like seen here from 1926-27 link
Correct, not meant to be khaki, more of a canvas duck for the pants, and tanned leather for the gloves.
I swear that the royal blue in the 70s/80s was more purple than blue.
As much as I like the Classic Gretzky era unis, it’s surprising just how much real estate those stripes on the body took up. Have to say, I thought they should have kept the orange WHA throwbacks with the shoulder numbers as the primary home sweaters.
The originals always. Though I will say that the current set is close enough for my tastes so I’m good with it. They key is the royal blue and orange. get out of here with that navy and copper nonsense.
2021 Reverse Retro. Really nice. Otherwise, the Gretzky era uniforms.