system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why do horses need horse shoes?
gpt
They don't, strictly. Wild horses and zebras and the like get along fine without them.

Domesticated horses are normally put under more stress than their wild counterparts, however. Just carrying a rider is a significant amount of extra weight; draft horses have to haul much more, and usually have to do so at faster speeds and for greater distance than wild horses normally travel. That amount of stress would wear through a bare hoof.

Really its the same reason humans wear shoes: it protects our feet and lets us walk or run more than we would be able to otherwise.