Best exercise bike 2020: brilliant spin bikes to avoid a gym membership

published 22 April 2020

If there's one warning to give before you buy the best exercise bike for you, it is: are you sure you'll use it for more than a week?

UPDATE: There's a new exercise bike on the scene in the form of Apex. This new premium at-home spin bike promises to bring your favourite spin class to you thanks to a team up with London spin studio Boom Cycle - who describe their classes as a 'party-on-the-bike'. There are four colour options available - black, navy, white, sand - and Bluetooth enables you to connect the bike to your iPad or phone. And while no exercise bikes are cheap, Apex is relatively affordable. The bike itself costs £1,200 with an extra £30 per month for a subscription to take advantage of that exclusive Boom Cycle content.

Our top tips for keeping the habit up include setting times when you'll get on the thing. Don't even think about it, just do it.

Exercise bikes can also be quite dull to work out on, so make sure you have a tablet at the ready. An episode of Queer Eye makes 30 minutes on the bike far more enjoyable.

And, best of all, consider getting an exercise bike that supports one of the top bike-tracking platforms. These are iFit, Zwift and Peloton. They offer video classes and visualisations of routes that let you look at more than just the blank wall of your spare room.

Still motivated to get fit with a static bike? Here are some of the best options around, from basic bikes you can use while watching the TV, to "pro" style ones great for training when you just can't get out on the road.

Upvote your favourite, and let us know of any other exercise bikes that should feature using the form at the bottom.

Ride a real bike, too? Check out the best bike lights, tested by our expert. And here's a guide to the best bike turbo trainer.

Best exercise bike 2020

Bikes like this are where you move from basic exercise machines to ones that function better for actual training. The NordickTrack GX 3.9 has a road bike-like seated position and racing pedals with a cage that lets you exert force on both the up and downstrokes.It has a display for stats and the like, but cannot link up with the iFit platform like some of NordicTrack’s more expensive gear. That’s a subscription service where you get video lessons and can track your performance.

The Concept2 BikeErg is one of our favourite no-nonsense high-end static bikes. It does not come tied to an expensive trendy fitness platform, but does have a basic display computer for straightforward workouts.And if you do want a more high-tech experience, you can have it. The BikeErg hooks up with Zwift over Bluetooth, but it won’t change its resistance level automatically, like a Wattbike Atom. But at £600 less, we’d definitely keep an eye on the BikeErg. A grand is more than enough for most of us to spend.

Peloton is the Silicon Valley of exercise bikes. It’s trendy and expensive, made for people who want the best but have little time to spend weeks researching all the options out there.The bike itself costs around £2000, and you can get slightly pricier packages that include clip-in shoes and other accessories. It has a massive 22-inch screen, which tells you the real appeal of the Peloton package. It hooks up to a £39 a month service that offers live lessons, effectively spin classes in your living room.

Here’s our recumbent bike pick. You sit back, in a more relaxed position, with a bike like the V-Fit G-RC. This means your core isn’t engaged, but you may find it a better fit if you suffer from mild back pain.The V-Fit Bike G-RC’s display shows only basic stats for your speed, calories and so on. But there are heart rate grips down by the seat. You’ll find a bike just like this in most gyms. Unlike some of those, though, you need to manually adjust tension using a dial on the front column.

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Tell us about it, and if enough people agree we'll add it in.

Andrew Williams has written about tech for a decade. He has written for a stack of magazines and websites including Wired, TrustedReviews, TechRadar and Stuff.

Recommended reading

Best exercise bike 2020: brilliant spin bikes to avoid a gym membership

Best exercise bike 2020

SOMETHING MISSING FROM OUR SHORTLIST?

Please wait...