The best bike locks we tested
Best U-lock: Kryptonite New-U New York Fahgettaboudit Mini
Best chain lock: Kryptonite New York Fahgettaboudit Chain 1415 & New York Disc Lock
Most secure bike lock: Hiplok DX1000
Whether you ride your bike as a commuter, hop on a road cycle for a workout or enjoy the thrill of a joyride on a gravel bike, one thing brings all bicycle and electric bike owners together: We don’t want them stolen. One of the best ways to avoid that is to get a quality bike lock and ensure you know how to use it. But with so many bike locks on the market — and so many ways bike thieves can break them — it can be tricky to find the right one. That’s why we called in 13 of the most popular bike locks and tested them against everything from hacksaws and angle grinders to the actual Jaws of Life.
The truth is no lock guarantees the security of your bike. Unfortunately, we were able to destroy every lock we tested. However, some were far easier to break through than we expected and quite a few put up enough of a fight that they’d likely send a thief looking elsewhere for an easier target.
What we settled on as the absolute best were three bike locks that cater to different riders and budgets. All told, the best bike lock should give you a reliable shot at keeping your bike to ride for another day, and our three favorites did exactly that. Here are the best bike locks we tested.
Modestly sized but mighty strong, the Kryptonite New-U New York Fahgettaboudit Mini held up well to all but the most serious attacks, and even then held out for an impressive amount of time. This is a compelling lock for most bike owners, with a convenient design and good price.
Combining a heavy-duty chain with a small but robust U-lock, the Kryptonite New York Fahgettaboudit Chain 1415 and New York Disc Lock provide extreme flexibility alongside robust security. The extreme weight will likely deter some cyclists, but the sturdy design should also deter would-be thieves.
No lock held up in our testing like the Hiplok DX1000. This lock is specifically designed to resist attacks from an angle grinder, which chewed through most other locks with little sweat. While it isn’t indestructible, it presents enough of a challenge that thieves will likely look elsewhere first. At $350, it's not for everyone but if security is paramount, the DX1000 (or its smaller sibling the D1000) is your best bet.
Best U-lock: Kryptonite New-U New York Fahgettaboudit Mini
The Kryptonite New-U New York Fahgettaboudit Mini is an excellent blend of security and convenience from a U-lock. This model has the thickest shackle of the Kryptonite models we tested, and its smaller opening leaves little room for thieves to maneuver and find angles of attack between your bike and securing post. The lock has a thick vinyl exterior to avoid damaging your bike. It also has a sliding keyhole cover to protect it from the weather, and having personally experienced both rusted-out and frozen keyholes, that cover is no small benefit. While it doesn’t have an included bike mount, and it can be a little tricky to hold in place while locking and unlocking, its balance of portability, security and price was unmatched in our testing.
The biggest reason the Fahgettaboudit Mini is our top pick is its considerable protection. It held up better than almost every other lock we tested save Hiplok’s, which costs significantly more and lacks a few of the convenience features of this model. We needed more than a minute with an angle grinder to cut through just one side of the Fahgettaboudit’s shackle. Even then, the lock held firm, and wasn’t going to give up a bike. It would take a second cut on the opposite side to fully defeat this lock. That’s a lot of time and work for a thief, and they’ll likely be working with less ideal conditions than we tested in.
Beyond security, the lock has a few convenient features, too. Even though it’s beefy, it has a short length, which can help it fit into backpacks and slings more readily, or it can simply hang from your handlebars without flopping around like some of the longer U-locks. It has three keys, so you’ll have spares (Kryptonite can also replace them if you register them online first), and one key includes an LED light. Kryptonite also has an Anti-Theft Protection Offer, which may pay for a replacement bike or insurance deductible if your bike is stolen after the lock is broken or opened by force. You can find out more about that service here. Only OnGuard offers a similar program. However, it’s not free and doesn’t cover expensive bikes or theft where power tools were used.
By balancing affordability with a high degree of protection, the Kryptonite New-U New York Fahgettaboudit Mini stands out as a great all-around option.
Best chain lock: Kryptonite New York Fahgettaboudit Chain 1415 & New York Disc Lock
Chain locks have an advantage over U-locks for their flexibility, although they don’t necessarily offer any improvements to security. Plus, they come with the disadvantage of size and weight. If flexibility is paramount, the Kryptonite New York Fahgettaboudit Chain 1415 and New York Disc Lock are the chain lock combination to get. This combo item effectively combines an incredibly robust (and heavy) chain with a pint-sized version of the Kryptonite New York lock. We saw that the New York U-lock is strong, but not completely indestructible, succumbing to an angle-grinder attack after a little over a minute. The U-lock’s smaller dimensions do make it harder to approach, especially with a chain occupying some of the available space.
The chain itself is also robust. Against an angle grinder, the links held up for 45 seconds, and that only saw the grinder get through one side of a chain link. To fully defeat the lock, a thief would need to make another cut to the same link. Because of the weight of the chain and its flexibility, making cuts on it is difficult, and with less-than-ideal conditions, it could be significantly harder to cut through. This easily beat out the durability of the other chain locks we tested, which saw the angle grinder get through them in seconds compared to the Fahgettaboudit Chain’s minute-plus.
Besides its solid security, the Kryptonite Chain has several features that make it easy to use daily.?For one, the chain is wrapped in a soft sleeve to avoid damaging your ride, and the U-lock has the same key cylinder cover we’ve seen on Kryptonite’s other locks, helping protect it from the weather. It’s an altogether well-rounded package, though admittedly is a little hard to use given the sheer weight of the chain. The lock and chain together are substantially heavier than any of the other locks we tested, weighing in at more than 15 pounds, and that’s no small load to add to every bike trip. Though the chain can bundle up for storage, it’s still lumpy and won’t fit in small bags easily. It’s better suited to a pannier bag or a basket.
The weight can also make using the lock a little more difficult. It largely requires holding both ends of the chain as you maneuver it around your bike and locking post, as the weight of the chain will try to drag everything back to the ground. The size of the chain links can also make it tough to weave through tight bike geometry. Smaller chains like the Abus Ivera 7210 and Hiplok Original don’t struggle as much with this, but they’re much less secure and shorter. On the plus side, the chain’s length will often be enough to get around multiple bikes.
Most secure lock: Hiplok DX1000
A $350 lock won’t make sense for everyone, but if you have an expensive or cherished bike you want to keep as secure as possible, Hiplok’s DX1000 (and the smaller but functionally equivalent D1000) stands apart. This is a sizable piece of hardware designed with both bikes and motorcycles in mind. Hiplok has formulated a special shackle for this lock that is angle-grinder-resistant — and it lives up to this claim.
We tested it against an angle grinder and it put up an incredible fight. Where most of the other locks in our testing succumbed to the grinder either in a matter of moments or after a minute or so for the best of them, the DX1000 burned through one cutting disc and showed no signs of relenting to a second disc. The angle grinder got through the rubberized exterior of the lock but made no obvious progress in defeating the lock. The fire department who assisted with stress testing each of the locks was able to finally break the DX10000 with their industrial-grade hydraulic spreader, seeing the lock explode in the process. But even that took careful positioning of the spreader’s jaws — something a thief is not likely to have such an easy time managing with the DX1000’s interior already filled with a bike frame and securing post.
This is not to say that the DX1000 cannot be defeated with enough patience, the right tools and a skilled hand. John Milbank over at Bennett’s Bike Social has a lot of experience grinding through locks and was able to break through the DX1000, but it took more work and time than we needed to get through any of the other locks we tested. The DX1000 set a high bar here in terms of security.
This beefy U-Lock is heavy, expensive and omits some quality-of-life features you might want in a lock. It still has a rubber coating to help avoid scratching up your bike, but I found the exposed ends of the shackle quite capable of marring a paint job while trying to lock up. The keyhole has a rubber flap that covers it up when necessary, but it’s a little fussier to use than the ones on the Kryptonite locks. The lock does rattle more than others we tested, especially those with a tighter fit between the shackle and crossbar. These factors, and its high price tag, kept us from recommending this as the best U-lock altogether. What you get for your money, however, is serious security.
Hiplok does have two options if you’re interested in top-tier security. The D1000 and DX1000 offer similar protection but are different sizes. The DX1000 may be ideal for large e-bikes, where thick frames could be hard to squeeze in with a locking post if the U-lock shackle opening isn’t big enough. For bikes with thinner frames, the D1000 is likely better. The best locking strategy is to ensure there’s little extra space inside the shackle opening when your bike is locked up, as that makes it harder for a thief to get tools inside.
How we tested
A bike lock is meant to secure an important item in your life, and to that end, we sought to ensure the locks we recommend can actually do the job. So beyond simply getting a feel for the locks, their mechanisms, extra features and their ease of use on a bike, we put them to the test in a gauntlet of destruction with the help of a local fire department.
Usability
- Mechanism: We tested out the locking mechanism for each lock, seeing how easily it locked and unlocked, and how easily the shackle and crossbar came together. We also noted if any weren’t as obvious about whether or not they were properly locked.
- Portability: We considered how easy the locks were to bring on a bike ride, taking into account size, weight and any attachment mechanisms.
- Features: Beyond the basics of a lock and hard metal, we paid attention to what else the locks had to be more convenient and useful. Some included keys with LED lights. Some offered extra accessories. Many featured helpful covers to protect bikes from scratching and keyholes from dirt and debris.
Protection
- Hand tools: We tested the durability of the locks against a variety of simple hand tools that thieves can easily get their hands on. We took a hacksaw to the shackles, chains or bars. We used a metal-cutting drill bit on lock cylinders. And we took a sledgehammer to the locks to see if they would relent after a few dozen swings.
- Power tools: For further durability testing, we brought out more capable tools. A hydraulic rebar cutter was used where possible to try clipping locks, though this ultimately broke on some lower-grade locks. The beloved bike owner’s worst enemy, the portable angle grinder, was also used to see how long each lock could last against one of the most successful tools for defeating locks. In addition, we let the fire department take the Jaws of Life and a hydraulic spreader to the most robust locks just to see what specialized hardware could do.
How to choose a bike lock
There are many factors in choosing a bike lock, and not everyone needs the most secure option. You’ll want to consider where you live, the value of your bike (both monetary and sentimental value), where you’ll be locking your bike, when you’ll be locking your bike, what you’ll be locking your bike to and what will make sense for you from a lock.
For instance, the $350 Hiplok DX1000 is probably not the lock you should buy for a $100 bike you use to poke around town. The same lock that might secure your bike outside a cafe for a couple of hours in the middle of the day also won’t be the same one you’d want to lock up with overnight in the middle of a big city. A beefy chain lock provides serious security but is also heavy and uncomfortable to the point it may deter you from riding altogether.
To get a better sense of what riders should know about securing their bikes, we spoke to Rob Brunt, a former detective with the Vancouver Police who worked on bike theft and the chief outreach officer of Project 529, an organization working to educate riders and creating a registry of bikes to help deter theft and facilitate the recovery of lost or stolen bikes. In addition to Brunt’s work in Vancouver, he’s worked with police departments from Colombia to New Zealand to the UK and the US.
Brunt explained that avoiding bike theft comes down to many factors. In addition to the lock you choose, how, where and when you lock your bike will play a part. Brunt notes that you don’t want to be the low-hanging fruit, as one of the key considerations for a thief is how quickly they can get in and out with your bike. If you have a strong lock and park next to several other bikes with weaker locks, you’re less likely to see your bike stolen.
Locking your bike up outside overnight is a bad idea altogether. As we saw, all locks can be defeated with enough time and effort, and Brunt said a bike left long enough will eventually be attacked. That said, you can’t count on the daytime to be safer, as Brunt indicated most bike theft he saw was during the day, as that’s when most bikers are out.
Even the strongest lock in the world won’t guarantee the safety of your bike. Brunt has seen someone cut through a tree to steal a bike and has even witnessed thieves pull up in a rental moving truck and steal an entire rack loaded with bikes. Thieves can also set up what Brunt called “sucker poles,” which have already had bolts and such removed, so once you lock your bike to the pole, the thief only has to walk up, slide the pole out of the ground, and then can ride away with your bike. A strong lock wrapped around a weak rack means the thief could cut through the rack instead.
Brunt notes that learning how to use your lock is just as important as the lock you get. Poor locking technique can make even the most robust lock trivial to defeat. I saw a fellow cyclist with a perfectly good U-lock wrap it around just the front fork of their bike, which would allow a thief to remove their wheel, lift the bike free, and reattach the wheel in seconds with just their bare hands.
What kind of bike lock should I get?
It’s not enough that there are different models of locks, but there are also various types of bike locks. What you want for securing a bike depends on your own situation.
U-locks provide strong security in a simple form factor. They’re designed to wrap around the frame of your bike and a securing point. Ideally, they’ll have just enough room inside for those two things, so thieves can’t get tools in easily or maneuver them around. U-locks balance security and weight, tending not to weigh as much as chains of similar security levels.
Chain locks are flexible, making it easier to weave them around more parts of the bike — like the frame and a wheel — or to wrap around different objects to lock a bike to, such as a tree or anything wider than a U-lock can get around. The flexibility and length also allow chain locks to secure multiple bikes together. That said, many chain locks use thinner chain links than the shackles on U-locks, and can therefore be cut through more easily. In this way, they can sacrifice some security for convenience.
Folding locks prioritize convenience. They tend to use metal bars connected with hinges to fold into a small footprint that’s easily stowed away or attached to a bike. However, these folding locks don’t tend to be easier to get around a bike and secure to a post than U-locks, and they aren’t as flexible as chain locks. The few folding bike locks we tested were so easily defeated that we wouldn’t recommend using them for your bike. They may be useful for locking up accessories and serving as an auxiliary lock for your bike but we find cable locks far more convenient for those thanks to their superior flexibility, length and low weight.
How to properly lock your bike
How you lock up your bike can be as important as the lock you use. As mentioned above, you want to make your bike harder to steal than other bikes around. Good locking technique can help.
With any lock — U-lock, chain or folding lock — you want to make sure you get it around a closed loop in your bike frame. This ensures that the bike or lock has to be broken to separate them. Many riders make the mistake of looping a lock through the wrong part of their bike. A lock through a wheel is a good way to keep your wheel but can see your bike stolen easily. A lock around the front fork will likely take little effort for a thief to free your bike. You’ll also want to be sure not to lock around parts bolted in place, like racks or handlebars.
The next thing is to try making your lock harder to attack. Attach your lock at a higher point on your bike away from the ground and leave as little space or slack in the lock as possible. Attaching your lock close to the ground can make it easier to approach with bolt cutters, letting a thief use the ground to their advantage. If there’s extra space in your lock or it can easily move around, a thief will have an easier time getting tools into an ideal position.
You should also consider and vet what you’re trying to lock your bike to. Cheap bike racks with hollow metal tubing might be easier for a thief to cut through than your bike lock. Many street signs and parking meters aren’t as secure as they seem. Some are held in place by a single bolt and can be lifted away easily with few tools. This might not let a thief remove your lock, but a thief can still get away with your bike with the lock attached. So, always double-check that you lock to something sturdy and secured into the ground.
Even with all these tips, none of these locks or locking techniques can guarantee that your bike won’t get stolen. With enough time and determination, a thief can get to any bike. These locks and tips are meant to give you the best shot of protecting your bike by deterring or delaying a would-be thief.
