The Greatest Mountain Bike Shorts for Ladies of 2024

There’s nothing extra annoying than a pair of ill-fitting bike shorts. You need to have the ability to concentrate on the journey, not struggle along with your shorts. Woman shredders used to must make do with a pair of shrunken males’s shorts, however these days are lengthy gone.

We’re joyful to report that there’s now all kinds of mountain bike shorts made particularly for girls. We’ve been using trails throughout the U.S., together with plenty of miles in Oregon and Colorado, with take a look at notes from expert riders, newbies, {and professional} mountain bikers.

And whereas there isn’t a single pair of shorts that works for each physique and using type, we’ve included quite a lot of choices. Beneath, you’ll discover one of the best shorts and chamois that may make hitting the paths that rather more enjoyable. Get able to go well with up and journey out.

For extra details about ladies’s mountain bike shorts and the assorted design options to contemplate, try our purchaser’s information and FAQ. Additionally, take a look at our comparability chart to steer your decision-making. In any other case, we divided this record into helpful classes so you’ll be able to simply discover one of the best ladies’s mountain bike shorts in your wants.

Editor’s Be aware: We up to date our Ladies’s Mountain Bike Shorts information on June 25, 2024, with the addition of a number of new fashions, together with the Curious Creatures Ramble Scramble and Marilyn Shorts, in addition to the inexpensive Flylow Lola Shorts.

The Greatest Ladies’s Mountain Bike Shorts of 2024

Better of the Relaxation

Ladies’s Bike Shorts Comparability Chart

 How We Examined Ladies’s Mountain Bike Shorts

The GearJunkie testing crew is made up of newbie to knowledgeable street cyclists, bikepackers, mountain bikers, and racers. We’ve ridden cross-country and steep alpine trails everywhere in the West, together with in competitions, whereas bikepacking throughout the Rockies, and on self-supported journeys just like the 142-mile Kokopelli Path.

Ladies’s mountain bike shorts are important for staying comfy whereas in movement and loading the bikes, hanging out with mates, or establishing camp after masking miles. Over time, we’ve examined many alternative mountain bike shorts, and this record contains one of the best of one of the best.

To level, Senior Editor Morgan Tilton has examined mountain bike shorts for near 320 miles of rides with 47,000 ft of ascent/descent in 2023 alone. Except for testing bike gear, she helps handle the gear-testing flock.

Whereas testing ladies’s mountain bike shorts within the subject, we assessed sturdiness, general match, ease of motion, safety, material really feel, breathability, and performance. We’ve examined shorts whereas pedaling in blustery wind, intense solar, rain, and hail storms from close-to-town singletrack to distant backcountry tundra.

Past our crew’s expertise, we additionally thought of the most well-liked, extremely rated, acclaimed, and bestselling shorts in the marketplace, in addition to a broad vary of worth factors, options, and types to fulfill the wants of varied forms of bikers. Should you’ve in some way managed to make it this far however are looking for males’s mountain bike shorts, we’ve examined and reviewed these, too.

Purchaser’s Information: How you can Select Ladies’s Mountain Bike Shorts

Chamois

One of many first items of recommendation we give first-time riders is to exit and buy a pair of shorts with a great chamois or a padded liner brief to go along with your saggy shorts. It’s the only most essential (and infrequently ignored) piece of substances that may make or break your journey. In any case, we’re speaking about your butt right here! You recognize what we’re speaking about when you’ve ever skilled a saddle sore. And when you haven’t, let’s attempt to preserve it that method with a few of our favourite shorts.

Pronounced SHAM-mee, the chamois is the pad that’s sewn right into a biking brief to guard the groin space and sit bones in opposition to the saddle. The chamois is constructed with a pad that has cushioned foam with a variety of densities — some designs supply extra cushion than others. Usually, the supplies additionally wick moisture and are delicate. Carrying a chamois as a substitute of normal underwear additionally eliminates seams, which might rub and trigger chafing.

In mountain bike shorts, the chamois might be built-in into the shorts, however extra usually, the chamois is built-in into a brief, tight-fitting liner worn beneath the outside bike shorts. Some saggy shorts are bought with a chamois liner, which is good to have included within the buy. Most of the time, nevertheless, these are usually not one of the best. They’re higher than nothing, after all, however the best-performing chamois are usually an aftermarket buy. A few of our favorites are the Shredly YOGACHAM and the Velocio Path Mesh Bib Liner.

Materials

As the value goes up on mountain bike shorts, a part of that tag is masking the improve to extra premium supplies. No matter worth, almost all mountain bike shorts are product of a mix of polyester or nylon and elastane or spandex that has a little bit of stretch and is meant to dry rapidly.

For instance, the Norrøna Fjora Flex and Norrøna Fjora Heavy Obligation have a troublesome, stretchy material made out of an artificial mix that provides wind and water resistance, plus it options 50% recycled fibers and a PFC-free DWR. The Shredly Limitless 11″ feels softer and lighter — it’s made with a recycled polyester-spandex mix and prices much less.

The Wild Rye Freel is constructed with a WR Duraflex Nylon (88% nylon, 12% spandex), which is hard in opposition to reachy trailside branches. Comparatively, the Wild Rye Kaweah is made with the WR Bomber Stretch Poly (90% polyester, 10% spandex), a mix that’s nonetheless sturdy however not as powerful and at a cheaper price level.

Waistband

A spread of waistband designs exist, and they’re distinctive for every brief. What’s most essential is that the waistband doesn’t fold over or pop open or pinch your decrease abdomen whilst you lean ahead in your bike. It’s additionally good to have a waistband with adjustability so you’ll be able to forgo a belt and tighten your shorts as wanted, particularly if the journey is especially lengthy, sweaty, or wet.

Some trendy mountain bike shorts include broad, stretchy waistbands to softly and comfortably hug your waist — much like your favourite pair of yoga pants. The Shredly Limitless 11″ shorts are an ideal instance, and the stretch waist is among the predominant causes we like them a lot. Equally, the Curious Creatures Marilyn Shorts have a excessive waist and a easy zipper on the aspect. The broad waistband is tremendous comfy and supplies a flattering match.

Many ladies’s mountain bike shorts have extra conventional waistbands and closures. The Wild Rye Freel shorts, for instance, have a double-snap, zip closure, and huge, stretchy width, plus belt loops when you determine to go that route. The Velocio Ultralight Path Shorts are comparable, plus they arrive with a stretchy efficiency belt as an added bonus.

For probably the most adjustability, many fashions have adjustable options constructed into the waistband so you’ll be able to customise the match inside a small vary. Velcro tabs are one of the frequent methods to do that. Each the Flylow Lola Shorts and the Membership Experience Eden have this type of adjustment — each even have belt loops on case that’s your desire. Equally, the Norrøna Fjora Flex each have double-snap closures with a zipper and built-in Velcro adjustment tabs.

Pockets

Pockets might be useful for a spot to rapidly stuff your journey gloves on a snack break or to heat up your arms whereas tailgating. Different pockets secured with a zipper generally is a great spot to carry a telephone or bank card, whereas pockets with a snap closure generally is a good place for a snack bar.

Some mountain bike brief designs include minimal pockets just like the Curious Creatures Marilyn, which solely has a single zippered pocket. Different shorts supply tons of pocket choices just like the Curious Creatures Ramble Scramble or the Membership Experience Eden, which have two again pockets, two aspect pockets, and an extra pocket with a zipper closure. The wealth of conventional pockets on these shorts is especially practical and helpful off the bike.

Most shorts supply one thing in between, with a median of three pockets, just like the Wild Rye Kaweah, which has two hand pockets and one low-down zippered pocket.

In a well-constructed improve, the Shredly Limitless 11″ now contains a zippered pocket, and the location is increased on the thigh to assist take away the jostle of a telephone whilst you pedal. In distinction, many zippered pockets on different shorts are down decrease on the leg and inevitably swing round whilst you journey.

Inseam Size 

The most effective inseam size comes down to non-public desire, the kind of using you do, the weather you’ll be using in, and your type. Should you’re occurring a protracted journey in sunny, uncovered (as in, no tree protection or shade) terrain, contemplate sporting longer shorts to guard the tops of your legs from getting sunburned.

Longer shorts also can defend the aspect of the legs from thick brush, tree branches, or bugs when you’re using in a buggy space or on a wild, unkempt path. Should you’re bikepacking or alpine using on steep slopes and getting on and off your bike, the longer material also can assist defend your legs from getting scraped up. An extended inseam additionally usually performs higher with knee pads and helps to forestall pad hole — a spot between the underside of the shorts and the highest of the pad — and is mostly most well-liked by these doing extra aggressive using.

Shorter inseams depart extra of the thigh uncovered, which can be most well-liked by many women for type functions. The inseam lengths of the ladies’s mountain bike shorts in our information vary from 6 inches to fifteen inches, with 9 to 12 inches being the candy spot for many path rides.

Then, with finely tailor-made inseams to numerous feminine physique shapes, Shredly provides an adjusted inseam size for every design and every measurement inside that design. As an illustration, the Limitless 11″ Quick, featured amongst our prime picks, has an inseam that varies barely throughout the sizes for a proportional match:

• Dimension 0: 10″
• Dimension 8: 11″
• Dimension 16: 11.5″

Match and Dimension Vary

Most manufacturers supply a measurement run from at the least measurement 0 to measurement 18.

Velocio provides a good broader measurement vary (XXS-3XL). Extra particularly, the Velocio XXS matches a 22- to 24-inch waist and 31.5- to 33.5-inch hip measurement. In distinction, Wild Rye, as an example, begins at a measurement 0, which inserts a 25.5-inch waist and 36.5-inch hip.

Shredly additionally provides a higher number of sizes with a 00 to 24 measurement run (XS-3XL), which begins at a 24-inch waist and 33-inch hips and goes as much as a 43-inch waist and 52-inch hips. Kitsbow’s shorts additionally supply a much wider measurement vary with waist sizes from 26 to 37 inches. 

You should definitely double-check the scale chart for every pair of shorts you contemplate shopping for, and to measure your self earlier than making an order or cease by a retailer to attempt on a pair first. Mountain bike brief sizes and the exact measurements for every measurement usually are not common and infrequently differ throughout manufacturers.

Value

Most girls’s mountain bike shorts hover round $100. That features Wild Rye Kaweah ($99), Membership Experience Eden Shorts ($100), and Shredly Limitless 11″ ($108) in our information.

Mountain bike shorts with a extra premium building that’s even more durable in opposition to the weather and a beatdown embody the Wild Rye Freel Shorts ($139) and Velocio Ultralight Path Quick ($159).

It may be difficult to search out great-fitting, well-made mountain bike shorts beneath $100, however the Flylow Lola Quick ($95) impressed us sufficient to turn into our favourite budget-friendly mannequin.

FAQ