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Best OverallWoom Explore

$819 Woom (Size 5)

Best Transitional BikePrevelo Alpha Two

$509 Prevelo

An Affordable AlternativeRetrospec Dart

$260 $240 (8% off) Retrospec

The Best Brake SystemGuardian Bikes 20-Inch Small Bike

$499 $299 (40% off) Guardian

Most people think I got my kids bikes because I like exercise, or because I want to combat climate change. Neither is true (or the entire answer, at any rate). It's just that sitting in pick-up or drop-off lines in a car makes me want to yeet myself straight into the path of an oncoming 18-wheeler. Now that my kids are 8 and 11 and old enough to bike with me, it's also much more fun to watch them hop curbs and swing their legs and shout, “We live in a jungle!” than it is, again, to wait for traffic lights to change.

The WIRED Reviews team has children, and we enlisted many of them to test so we could pick the best kids’ bikes for rides to school, on the trails, or around the park. Our top pick is the beloved Woom Series ($819), with the close runner-up of the Prevelo Alpha Two ($509). There are no electric bikes, because children do not belong on electric bikes.

If you’re shopping for yourself, don't forget to check out the rest of our outdoors guides, which also includes our guides to the Best Electric Bikes, Best Bike Helmets, and Best Electric Cargo Bikes for Families guides.

Updated March 18, 2026: We added the Prevelo Alpha Two and the Nüdl bike helmet. We also updated links and prices.

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- Best Overall

Photograph: Adrienne So

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Woom

Explore

$819 Woom (Size 5)

Woom is my favorite bike brand for children. You can start with a 12-inch Woom balance bike ($249) and upgrade to differentiated and bigger models from there. The sizes go all the way up to to the Woom 6 ($869), which is a 26-inch bike that even I can ride. You get a Woom because they're incredibly light. Kids are small. It's hard to learn how to ride on a cheap, heavy bike that weighs 30 pounds when you yourself are only 40 pounds. The build quality out of the box is also excellent—no cracked pedals, no wobbly handlebars, nice high-quality Schwalbe tires.

My kids have been riding in some version of the Woom since they were toddlers. My petite 11-year-old is now riding the Woom 5 Explore. Besides being incredibly light, another standout feature is MicroShift, which is an intuitive twist shifter to cycle between seven gears. She has noted that it's so much easier to shift than the other bikes that I make her ride, even the very nice Prevelo Zulu Four ($1,399). Something else to note is that Woom's sizing is a little optimistic; the online bike sizer has consistently slotted them into bikes that are just a little too big for them.

SpecsAge range18 mos to 14 yearsWeight (24-inch)20 lbs, 12 ozFrame materialAluminumShiftersMicroShift Trigger ShifterBrakesProMax hydraulic disc

- Best Transitional Bike

Photograph: Michael Mantovani

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Prevelo

Alpha Two

$509 Prevelo

Much like the beloved Woom brand, Prevelo makes bikes for kids. Rather than simply taking an adult bike and shrinking it down, Prevelos are designed and built with a focus on smaller bodies. For the Prevelo Alpha Two, I employed my 4-year-old daughter, who has spent the last two years on a Woom 2 ($459). She had little issue adapting from the 14” Woom to the 16” Alpha Two, owing in large part to Prevelo’s thoughtful geometry. At 12.1 pounds, it’s even lighter than the Woom 2, which made my daughter’s day at our local pump track even more enjoyable than usual. The Alpha Two also features Prevelo’s patented Balance Tec system, which allows users to easy convert it from a pedal bike to a balance bike and back with nothing more than a hex key.

The only knock I have here is that the Alpha Two features an internally routed cable for its rear brake. In other words, rather than running along the underside of the top tube, the brake cable is sent into and through the top tube, before coming out the back. Anyone who’s ever wrenched on an internally routed bike knows what a PITA they can be. That said, the frustration is usually due to losing track of your cables inside the bike. The Alpha Two’s internal routing only travels a few inches, so I’d assume it wouldn’t be the same ordeal as my 62 cm road bike. —Michael Venutolo-Mantovani

SpecsAge range4 to 6 yearsWeight (16-inch)12.1 lbsFrame materialAluminum alloyShiftersSingle speedBrakesHand brakes with internal cables

- An Affordable Alterna

Best Kids&#x27; Bikes (2026): Woom, Prevelo, Guardian, and More | WIRED

Best Kids' Bikes (2026): Woom, Prevelo, Guardian, and More | WIRED