In addition, not all the edges of the base are flush with the ground, just the foot contact points, and we noticed less stability with all pumps designed this way. The only result is displayed. It took 370 strokes to inflate the mountain bike tire and 260 strokes for the hybridsecond to worst of all the pumps in the test. It has a steel base and barrelin fact, the only plastic part is the pump head, which you push onto the valve and lock with a lever. When inflating tires, this pump still outperformed many of the others we tested, outdoing not just the similar Specialized Air Tool Sport, but even the Lezyne and the Air Tool Pro by a few strokes. The broad, flat handle outshines even that on the pricey Silca Pista, which couldnt fit two hands. We know its a small matter, but our testers appreciated the convenience. It also has to work with both Schrader and Presta valves, the two most common types in the US. If you can get your hands on this model, we think youll be very happy. That means it has to attach securely, remove easily, and be reasonably simple to figure out. Its as sturdy and reliable as pumps twice the price, and all of its components, from hose to gauge, are more generously sized than those of its competitors. The length of the stroke is unusually short, though, which meant we had to work hard for results. This mostly metal pump is a smart buy, from its extra-large pressure gauge to its recently redesigned screw-on pump head. Plus, whatever time you lose installing it, you gain on the opposite end of the process, when you simply unthread the chuck instead of having to yank at a push-on head that wont come off. Our testers liked it but felt that the gauge seemed breakable, and losable, since it was no longer attached to the pump. It has a removable, two-sided chuck: One end works with Presta tube valves, and the other works with Schrader. Hard-core bike commuters share seven itemsfrom storm-worthy gloves to rugged tiresthat keep them (and their stuff) safe and dry in the winter. Lezyne calls this head a flip chuck head. The L-shape also improves its ergonomics and provides an all-around more solid attachment. We had to keep the pump uncomfortably close to the tires. The Specialized Air Tool Pro was a tester favorite. While it wasnt the top performer, were not worried: When we do this test, were mostly looking for outlierseither intoxicatingly efficient or miserably inefficient designs. Look at a pumps hardware, advised Chris Haunold. It took us 200 pumps to get the hybrid test tire to 35 psi. Over the course of two years weve inflated tires more than 250 times. Another in the mini-floor-pump camp, the Topeak Road Morph G was the fastest pump in our tests, but its sizeits nearly 14 inches longseriously pushed the boundaries of portability. If you like to use valves with removable coresyou know who you arethe Pressure Drive has an integrated valve core tool. Metal tends to be more sturdy and will last a while.. Its true that its not a high-volume pump, the kind that is best suited for mountain bike tires. But its so stable, with a generously wide handle and sturdy base, that we think someone who will be using a pump a lotevery week, or even every daywould appreciate the upgrade. Dial in your tyre pressure exactly or get rolling again after a puncture with PROs range of floor and mini pumps. This is a pump made for someone who is going to use it a lot, and the handle and the base are where its best features are focused. Having to screw the head onto the valve takes a little longer than the usual push-on valves with a locking lever, but we think most people will appreciate the secure connection for the price of those few seconds. Whether or not the pump can be serviced. She has always been drawn to ideas about how to relate to, and play in, the wilderness. The valve attachment is a flip model, made of combined metal and plastic, and has the usual drawback: You have to make sure its properly attached or it might pop off suddenly. Any old-school cyclist will recognize the Topeak Pocket Rocket, but its a below-average performer. Pumps that have metal barrelsthats the largest single part of each pumpwill have a longer life span, so we focused on those. The Crankbrothers Sapphire had the best pumping performance, taking fewer strokes than any other model. We compared the construction of every pump to evaluate its potential longevity and sturdiness. Its a common flip model: You press it onto the tire tube valve and flip the handle up to secure it. Theyll all perform similarly, he saidthe designer didnt want his name or company affiliation mentionedbecause they all come from the same factories. He meant what he said, but as we discovered, the details count when it comes to pumps. We also tested two pumps from Serfas, the FMP 500 and the TCPC. But those are strictly for adding to your on-the-go repair kit and using when you get a flat on the roada floor pump takes a lot less effort to use. The Silca Pista has one of the strongest builds (all metal everything), but its small. Three inches in diameter, it has white numbers on a black background, plus a contrasting hi-vis yellow needle. Eve O'Neill is a senior staff writer reporting on travel and outdoors at Wirecutter. However, as with other heads of this type, you run the risk of the head popping off midstroke if you havent seated it correctly. The hose is another place this pump comes up short. PRO has your pre-ride and mid-ride inflation needs covered with a range of floor and mini pumps. She can remember the titles on her childhood bookshelf that set her in this direction: Into Thin Air, On The Road, The Call of the Wild. The floor pump range boasts models with digital or analogue pressure gauges as well as the Team Compressor, the ideal device for seating tubeless tyres. Most often itll be either the pump head or the hose seals. Whether it's finding great products or discovering helpful advice, we'll help you get it right (the first time). We log how many strokes it takes to reach the proper pressure, how ergonomic the handle is, how legible the dial is, and whether or not any tiny pieces spring loose and roll into a sewer grate while we were trying to switch between valves (it has happened twice). And it comes with a limited lifetime warranty, the most robust of any pump we tested. It does come with a mounting bracket, but the pump is so big that its hard to find an out-of-the-way place for it on smaller bike frames. That said, the ALX 2 inflated tires faster than almost every pump we looked at, including the Lezyne Classic Floor Drive and the pricey Specialized Air Tool Pro. To use the pump, remove the hose from its storage place inside the pumps body. That makes a huge difference when you are pumping up a 100 psi road bike tire and need leverage to work air into the tube. Matthew Edwards has spent five years in the cycling industry as a salesperson, mechanic, and amateur bike racer, and Dave Yasuda is a road, mountain, and commuting cyclist with more than 30 years in the saddle. Subscribe now for unlimited access. According to one pump designer we spoke to, yes. This is especially important, according to a former floor pump designer interviewed by our colleague Eric Hansen, because the head is often the only part that really differentiates one pump from another. At this point, weve researched more than 100 models, and our work always starts with reading what others have to say. Both the Pedros Prestige and Super Prestige pumps have wobbly, two-footed bases that couldnt outperform three-footed options. We independently review everything we recommend. The wooden handle is easy to use, and our testers all praised the pumps base. It has a valve attachment that is unique among all systems; its also both simple to attach and highly secure. If your biggest worry is cost, it will get the job done, but as we said before, the difference in quality between a $30 pump and a $50 pump is enormous. Weve seen gauges that, in spite of their massive size, are still hard to read because of a vexing layout or poor choice of font. 2022 Wirecutter, Inc., A New York Times Company, A reliable option with better-than-most features, Our pick for a floor pump: Lezyne Classic Floor Drive, Budget floor-pump pick: Planet Bike ALX 2, Upgrade floor-pump pick: Specialized Air Tool Pro, Also-great hand pump: Lezyne Pressure Drive, Lennard Zinn, senior tech writer for VeloNews, Daimeon Shanks, a former pro race team mechanic, replacement head/hose combos and other parts, Specialized Air Tool Sport SwitchHitter II, Cheap Essentials for Getting Back on Your Bike. None of the pumps we saw had any glow-in-the-dark markings on the gaugewhich would come in handy, say, for an early-morning ridebut this dial came the closest to providing that kind of visibility. Once youve done so, screw the head onto the valve. If you own a bike, you need a patch kit. We looked for pumps that nontechnical folks could disassemble to replace parts like O-rings and gaskets. Lezyne also provides a two-year warranty that covers manufacturer defects, and you can replace worn-out O-rings and the like with replacement parts from the Lezyne site. This generally means topping off your tubes weekly, because they leak air even when your bikes just sitting idle. The biggest ding to the Specialized Air Tool Sport was the illegible dial. Every time, the seal held fast no matter how hard we pumped. In addition, this is the only pump we found that comes with a limited lifetime warranty, which is much better than the industry-standard two years. The Pista Plus remedies these issues but for more than twice the price of our top pick. However, its larger and fits the hand more ergonomically than anything we tried, and its easy to secure and release. With pumps like this, which attach to a valve stem by screwing it on, its possible to unscrew a removable valve core (a few Presta valves have these) while removing your pump. Only one other pump we tested, the Crankbrothers Klic, also uses a screw-on head, but the Lezyne attachment is bigger and therefore easier to handle. Its twice the price, but it doesnt have twice the features of the Lezyne Classic, and thats why it isnt our top pick. Were assuming this was random, and not endemic, but either way we found sturdier pumps that cost less. Made of plastic, it works on both Presta and Schrader valves, and unlike the Lezynes head, you dont need to disassemble the chuck to change from one valve type to another. The footprint, on the receiving end of all that robust tire pumping, was the only one that provided an even steadier base than the Lezyne Classic Drive, with minimal rocking in any direction. The head of the Park Tools PFP-8 blew off a total of three times for two testersa surprise, considering Park Tools good reputation. We think the Lezyne Classic Floor Drive is the best pump for most people. Our testers also rated it highly in both steadiness and usabilitythe wide wooden handle really helps with that. The pump is comfortable and usable, and it even comes with a lifetime warranty, the best of anything we looked at, regardless of price. The Classic Floor Drive has a maximum inflation pressure of 220 psi, well above any pressure needed by the average cyclist and more than any other model we tried, except the (now discontinued) Serfas FMP-500, which is rated to 250 pounds. It was, however, the worst performer in our pump test, requiring 10 to 15 more strokes at all psi levels than the better performers. The Topeak RaceRocket was also not able to pump a 700c road tire to 100 psi; with this pump, it took us 60 more strokes to get our mountain bike tire to 30 psi than it did with our top pick. It combines an L-shaped head thats refreshingly easy to fit between spokes with a removable and reversible chuck (one end fits Schrader tire valves; the other, Presta valves). Eve ONeill, who is responsible for the most recent update, is a senior staff writer at Wirecutter and has been on the bike commuting beat since she joined the company. We tried the Vibrelli for due diligence, but with a shorter height and shorter hose than anything in the test pool, it felt like a toy in a giants hands. Bike pumps are simple devices and should last for years, with appropriate maintenance. The gauge is also notable. Its 34.5 inches long, the second shortest in our test pool. First, it does the basic labor of inflating your tires tubes. No matter what kind of bike you rideroad bike or mountain bike, beach cruiser or hybrid, ebike or unicycleyou need a way to inflate its tires. Youll see that the connection is super-reliable, it will never release until you want it to, and we havent noticed any air leaks during testing. The Planet Bike MicroPro Mini Bike Pump uses a thumb-lock valve in a fixed position on the end of the pump body. Its small enough to carry in a jersey pocket but also comes with a bracket that you can attach to your frame. The Pressure Drive is advertised as a low-volume, high-pressure pump for road bikes, and we were able to get to 100 psi on our 700c tire in 300 strokes. The Lezyne Sport Drive broke. Like all of our picks, it works with both Presta and Schrader valves, the two standard kinds of bike-tube valves in the US. Finally, Lezyne warranties pumps against defects in workmanship and materials for two years. Is it metal or plastic? Learn more. The drawbacks: its plastic, wedge-on pump head and very short hose. This is also the steadiest, sturdiest pump we tried, which made it a favorite among our testers. Are all bike pumps equal? We also prioritized pumps with other metal hardware, like levers and valve attachment points, which are more durable than the equivalent plastic parts. With this long of a hose, you can also place the pump toward the middle of your bike and inflate both tires without having to move the pump, regardless of the valve position on the wheels. Over the years, these have included Lennard Zinn, senior tech writer for VeloNews and owner of high-end bike builder Zinn Cycles; Daimeon Shanks, a former pro race team mechanic; Jason Bauer of Boises Bauerhaus Bikes, a Shimano-certified mechanic with more than 20 years of experience and longtime wrench for 24-hour-sold world-champion mountain biker Rebecca Rusch; Chris Haunold of Idaho Mountain Touring, a bike shop that has been a leader in the Boise cycling community for more than 30 years; and Nicola Cranmer, a longtime cyclist and general manager of Team Twenty20, a womens pro cycling team.