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A modified version of their alpine counterpart, twin-tip skis are designed to enable a skier to take off and land backward while jumping, or to simply ski backwards down a slope. The name "twin-tip" comes from the shape of the ski. While most alpine skis have a defined, curved-up front end (or "tip") as well as a flat rear end (or "tail"), twin-tip skis have a curved-up tip and tail. Along with a hourglass-shape sidecut, skiing backwards becomes an option with twin-tips. An often overlooked advantage of twin-tips is the fact that a curved up tail makes it easier for a skier to slide out of his turns in tight areas such as narrow chutes. Likewise, an often overlooked disadvatage is that they are more difficult to manage when trying to change over from the ascent to descent mode in the top of a steep chute.

Initially designed for Newschool Skiing, twin-tips have rapidly gained popularity. They are made with a wide range of flexibilities and base designs for different types of stylish maneuvers, and have successfully broken into the world of mainstream skiing. Their design has been refined continuously for almost a decade, and their use has expanded beyond the terrain park. Many of the widest skis on the market today are of the twin-tip variety, making them incredibly popular with big-mountain powder skiers, since they handle extremely well in deep snow. For this reason twin-tips are making their way into telemark skiers, they have a lot of flex and handle nicely on "telle's"^{[citation needed]}

Their increasing presence on the slopes is starting to cut into snowboarding's decade-long grip on "cool", and more young kids are turning back to skiing because of the fresh image twin-tips are creating. Many long-time skiers have mixed emotions about this new-wave brand of skiing. While some see it as a long overdue reaffirmation of skiing's true dominance of mountain culture, others see the influx of new-school skiers and wonder if skiing as they know it is all but dead.^{[citation needed]}