How wide are your bars?

Nope, wider the better.
My Ragley Blue Pig hardtail has 800mm bars on, and my Stooge Mk4 had 840mm bars.

780mm

44cm

780 cut from 800.

I used to cut them down to 760, but left 800mm on hardtail and full sus and don't really notice it anymore. Just feels normal

820mm on my Stooge. 460mm flared drops on my Genesis CDF.

I’m built like a badly shaved gorilla.

760 on my FlareMax and 740 on my jump bike. I'm thinking of making 740 the norm as I find that much more comfortable. I've got very broad shoulders too.
My commuter is about 680 - but I'm finding that bike increasingly uncomfortable.

800mm

760mm but the grips add 5mm each so 770mm edge to edge. Have also used 670, 711, 740, 750, 760, 800 and 810 since 2009 (don’t remember my exact bar widths in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s but from what I can recall and also a few photos and online catalogues, they were pretty wide and then stupidly narrow!) Been on 770 on both MTBs for about four years.

The trees are very tight here so narrower would be faster sometimes but this width feels good. Even wider was better (trees allowing) when my bikes had shorter reach but I don’t need wider now I’m on longer bikes.

Whatever the width of my hallway is. I think around 780mm maybe slightly narrower allowing for grips.

760 on full sus trail (770 with grips)
730 on rigid/XC (740 with grips)

For context, I'm 5ft8.

780mm for me, having used the official formula of buying longer ones, cutting them down to 760mm and going bugger, that's too narrow, then replacing them. I've got 800 on one bike but tbh I'll probably cut them at some point, they don't feel any better for me.

I am not a wide person though and I have fairly long bikes, if I was still on my old bike I'd probably want the width more

720mm on both bikes. any wider is daft imho.

bars should be just wider than your shoulders.

I think I'm 780mm on my big bikes and 735mm on my jump bike. I think 44cm on my road bike. I'm 195cm tall so could probably experiment with wider bars but haven't felt the need.

Mine are 700 (3 bikes) and 740 (1 bike) and 620 on my old race bike. Which also has a 71 degree head angle, apparently i'll die every time i ride it...

760. Anything wider and singletrack starts to become an issue in the summer months.

At 5'10 with a 6' span 780 seems the sweet spot for me.

810 on the Fatty, for leverage.
760 feels like xc, 780 trail, 800 for the big bike (Flaremax, so not 'big' for most folk!)

Shoulders at 38cm so 38/40 on the drop bar bike.

800mm on the big bike. 780 feels OK as well, but I can't be arsed to cut them down.

720mm on both bikes. any wider is daft imho.

bars should be just wider than your shoulders

I hope never to be sat next to you on an airplane. Unless 'just wider' is 100mm.

800mm but with a decent amount of back sweep.

My go to bar is the Stooge Moto bars. I've got them on my singlespeed stooge and my geared Hello Dave.

My bars on my xc bike are 780mm.

Although I'm only 5'11", I do have quite long arms so I do realise that wide bars aren't for everyone.

I was watching Bernard Kerr's YouTube channel the other day where he showed a list of the pivot team's bar widths, non over 770mm interestingly, which happens to be my preference.

Anything above 700 isn’t practical for some of the tracks I ride. My riding buddy can’t get through some of the gaps on our routes without clipping various bits of scenery ( both growing and track furniture). I don’t find wider bars work for me either, but that is just me. There isn’t a right or wrong here as I have an old hard tail with 580s on which feels a bit weird, but you get used to it.

Behind 440mm bar is where I spend most my time on two wheels. They are rather fabulous at weaving through the trees whilst being mere millimetres away from scuffing your shoulders on the passing trees.

But that is a CX bike so not great for the Golfie.

740 on street trials bike. <600 on commuter. Somewhere around 760 on hardtail. Guessing can't remember exactly.

Settled on 600ish back in the days when the fashion was to try to get your levers as close to the stem as possible, never saw the need for them to be any narrower, and never saw the need for them to be any wider since then.

730 on both acoustic and electric

760 on the hardtail and 780 on my full suspension bike, any wider and I would struggle at various bridges/tree gaps on my most commonly used trails so stick with what I have.

785 on the gnarpoons, 760 on the downcountry machine

Found that wide bars made the bike feel sluggish and trees felt very close at times

780mm. I've a carbon one I bought on a whim,those are 720mm but not sure how ill get on with them.

Prior to those before I went all modern, it was retrobike-esque with are 660-680 and narrower.

720mm & I'm 6ft with a +8cm ape index, makes me laugh when I see more human dimensioned riders with their arms outstretched on super wide bars just coz

720mm & I’m 6ft with a +8cm ape index,

That's flipping wide on a road bike
😁

800mm
800mm
800mm
500mm
460mm
440mm

Which was fine until I tired to hand them all up next to each other on a "6" bike bike rack

Mine are 800mm, I used to cut down to about 770 but I felt like riding a 29er when I first had one that with the higher front end would require wider bars to keep it relative.
Then I kept the wider bars on my last 27.5 and it also was fine.

I shouldn’t imagine it makes any real difference but it works in my head.

I've tried up to about 800 but cut them down to 760. Just too slow and unwieldy in tight going with the wide bars.

So weird to think that my Control Tech bars were uber wide at 23" back in the day.

I remember a guy in our group put a ridiculously wide set of X-Lite risers on his DNA Ti HT he looked like a ape, but they were probably 680mm or similar.

I have 580mm on my (hybrid) road bike (Giant Fastroad with Cane Creek ergos & SQlab inner bar ends) 🤢

And 730mm on my MTB (100mm FS with an offset rise bar), which is 740mm with grips.

420 on ye olde 531c road bike
440 on the CX/"gravel" bike
740 on the XC bike
740 on the Injooro bike

at 6ft3 the 740s feel perfect to me
funny how I originally had superwide 690's on there, and everyone was taking the mick at me skimming trees as we threaded our way down trails cos my bars were so wide, but now 740's are deemed hilariously and unfashionably narrow. everyone in my normal group has 740 or 760 Renthals.

the 420 feels a bit narrow, but 440 perfect on the drop bar bikes

780 on the hardtails.
800 on the full sus bikes.

Think that 780 is the sweet spot for me.
Thought about trimming the 800s down to 780 but they’re both carbon and I hate cutting the stuff.

800mm on both bikes, though while just pedalling along, I often have my hands holding just either side of the stem or over the top of the brakes.

Just got some 810’s from CRC yesterday, to replace the 780’s my bike came fitted with, though I am 6’2”. Friend has the same size bike, jumping on it for a moment, it felt so much better than mine (I’d borrowed the bike for a week or two previously, to test frame sizing, before buying mine).. I’d been assuming my bars were already 800, incorrectly. I’ve always had the widest bars possible, especially when 760 was the widest you could get. I had thought 800mm was too wide when they 1st came out (more marketing), for me it’s not & the very occasional tight fit between trees is a small inconvenience for a better overall cockpit feel that suit me. Don’t assume, try testing for yourself

800mm on both bikes, though while just pedalling along, I often have my hands holding just either side of the stem or over the top of the brakes.

I went from a narrow-barred old 26" to a 29er with 800mm bars. I haven't felt the need to cut them down as I simply don't think about them on the downhill so I assume their fine, but I've added plenty of bar tape either side of the stem, because I want my hands much closer together for the climbs.

For reference, I'm a lanky 6'4". On my road bike I went from the 46cm (+flare) bars that came on my XL down to 40cm to get my hands lined up nicely.

740mm on my mtb, 440mm on my road and gravel bike, I mostly ride road or gravel and anything less than 440 feels like it's restricting my ability to breathe, going from that to the 740 on the mtb always feels super wide as it is.

I endeded up with about 775 on both my bikes
5'8

800 on 3, 780 on 1.

Those running narrower bars, on account of wide ones being slow and sluggish, how long a stem are you running?

Those running narrower bars, on account of wide ones being slow and sluggish, how long a stem are you running?

Generally 50 to 70 mm, depending on the bike.

I cut down from 810 to 760 this year. I initially stuck a pair of old 760 bars back on thinking it would feel shit and be a short experiment. Turns out it felt great and made me feel more active on the bike. I cut my proper bars down as a result and haven't looked back. I'm a marginally apey 5'11" with relatively wide shoulders (struggle a bit with airline seats), but 760 seems to be my sweet spot. They're probably 770 with death grips on.

How much leverage do you really need - resistance to turning the front wheel has never been such an issue!
How much more leverage does 20 mm give? In the real world.
I am finding hitting trees is a much more “real” issue

dunno narrow i think 600 and something ish

“How much leverage do you really need – resistance to turning the front wheel has never been such an issue!”

If you’re riding a modern bike with wide bars you don’t turn the bars in the old sense, you tip the bike on its side, so the forces and leverages are quite different.

730, Easton Haven cut down a little bit from 760 I think. My local trails are Minley which can be pretty tight between the trees in places. Not sure I’d want any wider and I’m 6’2 with orangutan arms and wide shoulders.

I like wide (Stooge Moto currently on my hardtail, 800 mm). I always have done since my fave bike as a kid, which was a bit of a klunker with cowhorn handlebars. I've ridden narrower that I've liked (e.g. One One Mary) but even then I'd often hang my hands off the ends of the bars.

800mm felt fine when I built my Banshee, but the trees said otherwise.
760mm is the sweet spot.

The first proper wide bars I had (780) were adrecslatio. At 6’2”
Now 800. I preferred 820 but swopped to Vibrocore at 800 stock.
There’s an influence from head angle (62.5) offset and stem length (35). Feels right to me for control and body position, but yeah it’s a pain on tight singletrack.

Shoulders at 38cm so 38/40 on the drop bar bike.

Ooh, old school. Will work on a road bike but wider with shorter stem (and wider flare, short drop) is great for anything that'll tackle XC trails

Started off with 680, which felt fine until someone gifted me some old 740s which were immensely better.

Then I built up a new bike and stuck 780s on it, and they were immensely better again.

Then that bike got nicked and I built a new one with 800s and they felt normal.

Rode 820s today and they also felt normal.

I'm not really sure what to take away from this other than something in the region of 800mm "works for me".

The thing I like is how slow a process it is. Like, I got some 762mm wide bars- Sunlines maybe? And put them on my hemlock and it was just obviously too wide. Everyone made fun of it, and on the first group ride I crashed because I absolutely smashed the bar on a tree that I've ridden past a hundred times. Disaster.

Couple of years later and the exact same bike had 780s on it and they were absolutely fine. So the equation's definitely more complicated than "whatever length I just cut my new bars down by 20mm from", there's a time element too.

ton
Full Member

bars should be just wider than your shoulders.

I mean yeah, if you don't have elbows?

MTB has 780mm bars on it which I like and also happens to be the length Renthal Fatbars were when I bought mine. Prior to that I ran 780mm Syncros bars for about a year before my wife’s (GF at the time) landlord got fed up with them tearing his door frames and walls so I cut them to 750mm which was fine as well. I’ve ridden with 810mm bars and they were also fine. I just like how the Fatbars (31.8) feel.
I’m 180cm with a 183mm wingspan.

The wife is 165cm and rides 750mm but that might well just be habit (like my 780mm bars).

My road bike is whatever they were when I bought it in 2008 (too stiff! Could be wider).

I’m a relative short arse at 5ft 9” but have long arms. Hover around 780mm with a 35mm stem and lots of rise and back sweep. Had wider bars on the Stooge (Klunker and Scrambler) and they put wrists and arms in a very comfortable position

77cm just to match my username 😉

They were 800mm when I bought them. Found that the extra control was non-existent, but clipping trees was very existent.
They're now about 760mm, I think.

bars should be just wider than your shoulders.

I don't understand why folks feel the need to have rules about this stuff really. It's like the other thread that popped up about bar height and folks were talking about "start with your saddle at the height of your bars" All this stuff is so personal, it's otherwise pretty notional to some-one else. Like tilting the nose of your saddle down, or where you like the rotation of your brake levers.

You may as well ask; what colour should my eyes be?

I don’t understand why folks feel the need to have rules about this stuff really. It’s like the other thread that popped up about bar height and folks were talking about “start with your saddle at the height of your bars”

Definitely with bar width. With bar height, having them saddle height is a good rule-of-thumb to get started. You will always need to experiment a bit to find what works for you, but having bars at saddle height will generally give you a reasonable starting point. Having the steerer too long and cutting it shorter later is better than cutting it too short to begin with.

With bar width, you might as well buy 800 mm bars, try them, and cut them down 10 mm per side until you find something that works for you.

Has anyone saying shoulders actually measured their shoulder width, middle of the joint rather than the outside of the skin?

Average is around 400mm.

Maybe on a hipster fixie but not good on a proper off road MTB.

As above though it's personal. Next up, how big are your shoes?

770 for trail bike and hardtail, tried the full 800 and it was just too wide.

I put some old Raceface 750mm bars against my Spank 800s... there really isn't a lot of difference is there?! 😀

780 & 785mm for my MTBs.

Earlier this year I convinced myself that I needed to go narrower because my bikes were so long and unwieldy now, and the EWS pros were all closer to 750mm.

Did one ride on a 740mm bar and it was bloody terrifying. Not even interested in trying to adjust, just felt so wrong.

Did some other setup tweaks and got my confidence back anyway.

760mm on the 29er XC FS, it came with alloy 720's but I wanted carbon and wider so put Mt. Zoom flat carbons on there along with a 70mm stem - super rad and on trend I know 😉 - and 720 on the 29er XC HT, where are the ones that came off the FS as the ones that came on the HT when I got it were el cheapo Brand-X ones, I want to replace them with a wider set, but it's not that bad really.

760 mtb (I think...), 480 gravel, 440 road.

770mm plus grips for me.

I'd argue - because its STW so it's what we do 🙂 - sweep and rise are more important that width. I'm not really sensitive to bike setup (having had so many I suppose) but there are some bars I really don't get on with even if they are my 'normal' 780mm width. Nukeproof Horizons seem to have it nailed for me.

I did cut my last set of bars from 800 to 780 but really just to make them all the same. My old SolarisMax were 740s and after 5 mins didn't notice the lack of width. That bike now has 700s on tho for my daughter and they feel like old school 600s!

740mm on the Anthem, 640mm on the Ti-456 (2008 build) but those do feel a bit narrow these days. My singlespeed road bike has On-One Mary bars, they're 645mm but don't feel too narrow at all.

It's as relevant to everyone else as "What size frame do you ride?" "I'm thinking of getting a new frame and not sure what size to go for.. what size does everyone else ride"
Like it'd help with the decision! 😆
(Alternatively, replace "frame" with underpants)

I've been riding with 785mm for years.

I bought some quality brand 762mm bars and it took some time to get used to them on a 130mm AM full-suss, but then I was fine. I just put some 730mm bars on a second full-suss, a 150mm Trail bike, and they seem fine.

But when I put the original 785mm bars back on my hardtail, they just feel stupid. First, I am chipping paint off the doorways getting in and out of my apartment, then they just don't feel good to ride as if my wrist angle is in the wrong place.

I have wide shoulders, and am pretty tall. That obviously didn't mean I had to have stupidly wide bars.