Kids love bikes. There's no doubt about it - it forms the backbone to many a childhood memory and many parents look forward to the moment they give their children their first bike. But choosing the right kids bike can be difficult. You know yourself how you might buy your own new bike - you'd look at whether you can comfortably sit on the bike and touch the ground with your feet, you'd consider whether you can comfortably rotate the pedals and your legs don't hit anything and you'd want to reach the handlebars with the optimum bend in your arm so that it feels so comfortable you don't notice any strain anywhere. And of course, you have to like the colour and accessories it comes with or you can add to it. Well choosing a kids bike is not that much different except of course, your child might not have ever ridden before so this is a whole new experience you will want to prepare for - managing their expectations, anxieties and fears, their ability and confidence - and your concerns over safety and ease of use. So here's our 10 things you need to consider to choose the right kids bike:
1. Age and Height
It is too easy to use height as the only measuring stick for a bike's correct size. Be careful: it can easily be misleading as an indicator. You'll see on our kids bike range page, we list our bikes by age and then height so its a natural place to start. However, unlike many other brands, the age and height range overlaps dramatically for each of the bike ranges. As most kids' balance develops at roughly the same speed,
using age and height with ability is far more relevant. As parents, you know all too well the height differences of your kids' friends and peers. And height has absolutely no indicator of ability or confidence.
2. Ability and Confidence
Children learn to ride with greater ease, have more control on the bike and have a lot more fun if they are the master of their domain. Almost every parent we have come across likes the idea of buying a bike that their kids will grow into. Of course this makes sense financially, but there are negatives - the extra size, height and weight are quite daunting, and often a child can't actually properly ride the bike or safely control it. Where's the fun in that?! You know that not all the kids the same age have the same physical ability - just watch them in the playground and you'll see! So the same goes for riding a bike. Some will be able to manage the steering, pedaling or pushing (on a balance bike) and braking quite naturally yet others will really need to master each skill independently of each other. You have to subjectively judge, as a parent, what your child's ability is and this will help feed into your decision of what size bike is right for them. Whether a kid has ridden a balance bike or scooter will also influence thier ability when they move onto a bike with pedals so this is a deciding factor as well. Marion Turner from Essential Kids gives great insight into getting the E-450x3i for her 5 year old son. The bike looks huge under his small frame but judging his ability and confidence correctly meant she was able to stretch him to the next size bike. A good read for anyone who is still unsure about the right size bike for their child.
3. Physical Fit
A bike is the right size when your child can:
- Sit on the saddle and rest the balls of both feet on the ground.
- Straddle the top bar with a comfortable clearance and with both feet flat on the ground.
- Reach the handlebars with a slight bend in the arms when sitting on the seat. If there are handbrakes, your child should be able to grasp them and apply enough pressure to stop the bike.
As your child grows, you can raise the seat post and handlebar stem according to the owners manual limits. Another great tip is to set the handlebars back and with the seat put to the lowest level - this reduces the reach a little more and allows you more growing room.
4. Bike Weight
Would you ride a bike that is more than half your own weight? Could you imagine how hard that would be to not only propel the bike from stationery position, but to maneourve it around corners or up and down a curb? Well why would you expect your child to do the same, especially when they are learning to ride? When we started ByK Bikes, one of the biggest design factors was weight. There just wasn't a range of lightweight kids bikes anywhere in the world.
5. Girls/Boys Specific Design
Girl/Boy Childrens Bike Design - does it matter? From a specific riding point of view, the difference in the girls or boys shape design absolutely has no impact on functionality. In fact, a lower step through (which is the girls design) is an advantage for most young riders as it is easier to get on and off. Strength-wise, there is also no real difference in the design either. So it is more to do with the social aspect - there is an expectation in the market to have 2 different designs. We try to have as many gender neutral colours as we can in our range so there is enough choice for every boy or girl.
6. Longevity
How long will my kid ride the bike before they outgrow it? As a parent, you need to be comfortable the bike will last quite a while too. On that point, the most common reason kids have to move up a size on a normal bike is because of the lack of knee room between the seat and handlebars. This forces you to put up the seat and then your child loses interest or confidence in riding because the centre of gravity is really high and hence the bike becomes even more difficult to ride. A defining design feature of the ByK Bikes is the longer wheelbase - it is more ergonomically correct for a child's growing body and so, its almost like having the next size bike up for this knee space. In the end this means a ByK bike will last longer. In the images below, Review Zoo compares their new ByK E-450 to the previous kids bike they unsuccessfully tried to learn on. The design differences are obvious, specifically the extra leg room for a growing body, and the better weight distribution of the lower-slung, ergonomic design. Read more of their review here.
7. Hand-me-down / Re-sale ability
Many parents buy bikes knowing they can be handed down to younger siblings or cousins, friends, etc. That's why we try to have a range of colours that can suit both boys and girls with most of our ranges. With the explosion of ebay and gumtree and many new websites for specficially buying and selling bikes in Australia, many parents consider the re-sale value of products as an important buying criteria. Why not? If you buy a cheap bike for $100 with no re-sale value but alternatively you can buy a bike for $300 knowing you can resell it for $150 then you're kid is better off with a higher quality bike and you get a return on your investment.
8. Buying from a bike store vs a department store
You can do your reseach online and read every bit of info on even our website, but your local bike store experts can give specific advice for your child. This is something you will never get in a department store. Buying from a department store can sometimes mean the bike is not fully assembled but at a bike shop, it will be built by an expert who will ensure it is safe and set up specifically for the intended rider. Once you buy from a local store, you then have somewhere to go back for support, advice, maintenance and safety checks - from readjusting gears, fixing damage, dealing with a puncture, and so on. Build a friendship with your local store and they will look after you.
9. Training Wheels, Bike Stands and Accessories
Does it come with a kickstand? We get this question often from parents - they assume that every bike comes with a kickstand but you can't have both - it gets too messy to use both at the same time! The bikes with training wheels (the E-250 adn E-350 ranges) do not come with a kickstand. You can buy after-market kickstands if your kid takes the training wheels off (or doesn't use them at all if they have learnt to ride on a balance bike. Bells, baskets, spokey dokeys, lights, water bottles (and holders), bike racks (for bags or dolls!), knobby tyres, bike stands. We're sure there's more to this list. None of these are deal breakers but sometimes on the list of must haves for some kids! All of our bikes come with a bell and all bikes from the E-450 range and above come with kickstands. However, we know that a lot of parents use the promise of new accessories like a speciality bell or spokey dokeys as an incentive to taking their training wheels off. Kids do so well when they have a goal to work towards - don't you too?!
10. Colour
Not much to be said here. Kids can be picky when it comes to colour. We have tried really hard to have a large range of colour choices for our models. You'll see the biggest range of choice on our E-350 bikes for kids aged 4-6 as this seems to be the age group that are most demanding of a specific colour!
I have three small kids with ages ranging between 3&#;9 years old.. and we currently own no fewer than five children&#;s bicycles.
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Bicycling is one of the most basic and fun activities that kids can do for sports and for commuting. Where I live, bicycling liberates kids from about 7 years old to independently pedal to school and sports class, join the rest of the neighbourhood kids to go to the local supermarket, playgrounds, library.
If you start choosing a bicycle for your child, there&#;s quite a choice &#; from 12'&#; wheel size balance bikes to 26'&#; teenagers bikes with prices from 99EUR supermarket bikes to EUR electric-assist kids mountain bike.
Over the last 7 years, we&#;ve bought and used 7 different kids bikes. We&#;ve done research and made mistakes. We&#;ve also hit the jackpot with a few bikes.
Here&#;s what we&#;ve learned..
Start on a balance bike
The best way for small kids to learn how to bicycle is to use a balance bike.
The best age to learn bicycling on a balance bike is as soon as the child is comfortable running and jumping. We&#;ve put all our kids on the balance bike when they where about 2 years old.
The best balance bikes are the ones that are light and have a low minimum seat height to allow practicing as early as possible.
Both my daughters were riding the balance bike comfortably and rolling around without their feet touching the ground by the time were 3 years old and my son was rolling around comfortably on the pedal-less bike at just a little over 2 years old and switched to a pedal-bike a few months after turning 3.
Stabiliser wheels on a &#;normal&#; pedal bike make learning slower for kids, since the child is leaning on the stabiliser wheels and is not actively balancing the bike. Also &#; starting on a pedal bike means that the newbie bicyclist needs to learn balancing AND pedalling at the same time.
A daughter of a family friend started learning on a pedal bike with stabiliser wheels and while she is taller and more athletic compared to my daughters, it took her longer to learn to comfortably bicycle and she was a less confident bicyclist in the beginning.
Fit beats spec
The most important thing about your child&#;s bicycle is whether they fit well on it. This means being able to easily get on and off the bike, having a comfortable and natural position while riding and having the reach to do tight turns, pull the brakes and switch the gears.
This is especially crucial with smaller kids (3&#;5 years old), since they are less experienced and clumsier. Young kids also grow the fastest relative to their size, so there&#;s a temptation to buy a bigger bike.
The mistake I made was buying a bike that was just slightly too big for my second child. I bought it, since it was a nice bike. I thought that she&#;d grow into the bike quickly anyway and skipping one wheel size would mean she can use the fancy bike for longer.
The result was that my daughter developed a fear of her bike &#; it was hard to start and stop riding on due to the frame size. This discouraged her from biking and she definitely biked less than she would have done on a well-fitting bike.
At minimum, check the height of the child and their inseam height against the bike&#;s fit specification (most respectable brands have a nice table). If possible, I strongly recommend having the child try riding the bike. That&#;s especially true, if the child is in the lower end of the size that fits the bike.
If the bike you want is even &#;just a little&#; too big .. I recommend buying another smaller bike that fits well. Even if it&#;s used, or less fancy.
Beware of &#;supermarket&#; brands
Low-price &#;supermarket&#; children&#;s bicycles can be incredibly heavy and have sneaky hard to spot problems with fit &#; brake levers not meant for small hands, too wide &#;q-factor&#; (width between pedals) for small legs, too short crank length, etc.
For more children's bicyclesinformation, please contact us. We will provide professional answers.
When looking for our first kids bike, I saw a cheap starter bike + stabiliser wheels meant for 3-year olds to learn bicycling that weighed about 10 kilograms. We ended up buying a 99EUR balance for our daughter that weighs a smidge under 2kg! That&#;s a weight difference of 5 times. Extra 8kg is a huge difference for a 3-year old to lift and carry. That 99EUR bike has served all our 3 kids very well.
You can find a good bicycle weight reference by looking at bikes from reputable bicycle manufacturers, especially manufacturers that specialise on kids bikes. Don&#;t buy a bike that&#;s significantly heavier than the typical &#;good brand&#; bikes, especially for pre-school kids.
It&#;s harder to evaluate other important parts of the &#;bike fit&#; &#; reaching the brake levers comfortably, having a suitable q-factor and crank length, saddle position relative to pedals. Buying from a well-known bicycle brand or from a brand specialising on kids bikes is the most likely way to get a good fit.
Used is totally fine
Kids grow out of their bikes quickly &#; usually within 2 years in the pre-school age and 3&#;4 years later on. This means that there are a lot kids bikes sold on the second-hand market.
Kids bicycles are usually quite simple to maintain and fix, so even if the used bike needs a bit of maintenance or tuning, chances are it&#;s cheap.
We&#;ve bought two of our kids bikes second hand. This has allowed us to get a better bike than we would have otherwise bought. In both cases we bough from a private seller on an internet marketplace and it worked out well.
Avoid fancy tech
There are some really exciting fancy tech on kids bikes, such as carbon fiber fork or air suspension forks, oil-actuated disk brakes, tubeless tires. There&#;s even a balance bike with a carbon fiber frame!
I recommend seriously considering if you need this fancy technology. It can be fragile and hard to maintain.
I bought a bike for my 5 year old with an air suspension fork and disk brakes and have now had to fix bent disk rotors twice as well as spending several hours doing maintenance on the air fork.
We&#;ve never had issues with rigid aluminium forks and rim brakes. There&#;s absolutely zero noticeable performance difference for my 5 year old kids from having the disk brakes and air spring.
If I could fo back, I would choose a lightweight, simple to maintain and as durable as possible solution for the kids bike.
There is some tech that is worth having, though, in my experience. An internal gear hub and belt drive can be more expensive, but will require much less maintenance than a chain, cassette and derailleur system.
Kid fits the bike vs bike fits the kid
My 6 year old daughter most likely wanted a pink bicycle with a comfy seating position, a wicker basket at the front and ribbons hanging out from the edges of the handlebar. I mean &#; she didn&#;t know what she wanted, but in my mind, this bike would have fit her personality.
I, her father, on the other hand wanted a bicycle for her that I myself would have loved as a 6 year old boy &#; a cool aggressive mountain bike with suspension and thick tires and aggressive stickers.
So &#; we &#;agreed&#; that we will buy her the fancy mountain bike with chunky tires and an aggressive riding position.
Of course it turned out that she was uncomfortable on the aggressive bike and didn&#;t really care about the chunky tires and suspension. We ended up getting her the next size bike sooner than she would have needed it and loaned the mountain bike to his nephew who is a 6 year old boy that loves aggressive chunky bikes with suspension.
My learning from it is that it&#;s not only important that the kid fits on the bike. It&#;s also important that the bike fits the kid :).
If you are looking for more details, kindly visit children tricycle manufacturer.