The decksters are metal. I'd also looked at the shimano resin ones, but their lack of durability was an issue for me. The problem with the deckster is you have to buy cleats separately, so you're out $30-40 for a setup with no pedal. I'd thought about going with the A530 or the nashbar knockoff of it for ~$30, but the amount of times I want to use the platform is so low that I didn't want to have only one side with clipless for only those few times (now if the platform of the A530 was enough that the backside of it would make a broader platform for the clipless side, I would have considered it). Given that I really only want to go without riding shoes once a month or so, I had just considered taking the cheap resin mtb cages off my platform pedals and putting them back on every time I wanted to do it, but then decided to splurge on these, in part because I wanted to try the multi-release spd cleats, so the singe release cleats that came with the pedals went from my shoes to the deckster and the new multi-release cleats went on my shoes.