We all love a Peloton workout. The intensity, the instructor staring you down, keeping you in pace – it’s exhilarating. But if you’re working out in low-quality bike shorts, causing chafing, sweatiness, and an aching rear-end, it’s vastly less enjoyable.
And shopping for those bike shorts can be a challenge when you don’t know how to differentiate them! So we’ve compiled a list of the best padded bike shorts for Peloton workouts.
How we decided:
There are a whole host of different factors that can cause people to prefer one kind of padded bike shorts over another. But we limited our review here to the following:
1. Comfort
Comfort will often depend on your individual needs as a rider, but there are some factors like padding quality and closeness to the size chart that are universal.
2. Breathability
Breathability is one of the most important parts of an effective pair of padded bike shorts. Indeed, it is especially important for padded bike shorts because the padding can sometimes decrease breathability. But we’ve chosen items here that successfully maintain both breathability and quality padding.
3. Air-wicking capacity
The intensity of a Peloton workout gets most of us sweating – but that sweat can be uncomfortable and cause unnecessary chafing. The shorts on this list have excellent air wicking capability that will leave you cool, dry, and comfortable.
4. Quality
The final factor we used to decide on these best bike shorts is the quality of the material. Even if you have a pair of bike shorts that satisfies our other criteria, if it’s made of poor quality material, it won’t last you very long through the ups and downs and round-and-rounds of spin classes.
Overview
Before we break down each pair of shorts, here’s an overview of what we chose.
We broke our choices down by gender since these are specialized clothing items that are designed for traditionally “male” or “female” body types. But you know your body better than we do: if you’re male-identifying and you know you’ll fit better in one of our women’s items, go ahead and go with it! The same goes for the reverse.
With all that said, here are our picks for best padded bike shorts for peloton:
Women’s shorts:
- Nicewin – Women’s Bike Shorts 4D Gel Padding
- Eco-Daily – Women’s Padded Bike Shorts with Pocket
- Nooyme – Women’s Bike Shorts for Cycling with 3D Padding
Men’s shorts:
- Santic – Men’s Cycling Shorts
- Nicewin – Men’s Cycling 3D Padded Shorts
- Ezrun – Men’s 3D Padded Bike Shorts
Women’s Bike Shorts
1. Nicewin – Women’s Bike Shorts 4D Gel Padding
Nicewin’s Women’s Bike Shorts feature extremely comfortable 4D gel padding, quality chintz fabric, and a lovely print on the sides. The padding is stereoscopic, taking advantage of both silicone gel and high-density foam for a high level of shock absorption and vibration prevention.
The material is also highly elastic, allowing for a great deal of comfort during your rides. It also manages to effectively create an air-wicking phenomenon, leaving you dry where it counts.
That said, some reviewers have complained about the sizing on these shorts – they tend towards being smaller than the represented size, so keep that in mind as you’re making a purchase.
2. Eco-Daily – Women’s Padded Bike Shorts with Pocket
These are highly versatile shorts – great for Peloton, but also great if you want to bring them outdoors. That’s true in every element of the design, their padding structure, fabric quality, and the presence of a re-sizeable rear pocket. Even though you won’t be using pockets on a Peloton (likely anyway), these shorts give you the flexibility to use on any outdoor cycling adventures as well.
In addition to that, the shorts provide silicone grippers on the hem that allow you the confidence of comfort that they won’t be riding up on you while you’re working out. They’re also heavily and specially padded, maximizing your comfort.
Some reviewers found the extensive padding a little too much, though – so keep that in mind if you tend to prefer less padding in your bike shorts.
3. Nooyme – Women’s Bike Shorts for Cycling with 3D Padding
Nooyme’s entry on this list is another one of the best padded bike shorts for peloton. It’s an excellent 3D padded piece, made from 80% polyamide and 20% spandex with high elasticity and comfort. Its intense padding will protect you from friction and abrasions.
This model also includes leg grippers to prevent any riding up during your workout. Some reviewers did find these to be a little inconvenient for those with thicker legs, though most reviewers had no issue.
Men’s Bike Shorts
1. Santic – Men’s Cycling Shorts
Santic’s Men’s Cycling Shorts are a tour de force of excellent padded bike short creation. They’re made from a blend of spandex and nylon, with 82% nylon and 18% spandex, featuring a highly breathable mesh material that will keep you cool and dry throughout your workout.
The 4D padding is also excellent, providing substantial comfort in key areas without sacrificing breathability. Some reviewers have noted that these seem too tight to walk around in, though that is likely less of a problem if you just want to use them for your Peloton workouts.
2. Nicewin – Men’s Cycling 3D Padded Shorts
Nicewin’s biking shorts are not just designed to be used inside and behind closed doors. Nicewin’s model here works on a whole range of environments, from the Peloton to the road – even allowing for mountain biking.
These shorts come with both a moisture-wicking and a quick-drying functionality, and their padding goes all the way to the hips. This joins together with flat seams and anti-riding-up silicone grippers to make an overall powerful pair of bike shorts.
It is also valuable to note that, like the other Nicewin model we mentioned here, some reviewers found that these shorts were slightly smaller than the size.
3. Ezrun – Men’s 3D Padded Bike Shorts
Ezrun’s model is unique on this list because it is both padded and loose around the openings on each leg to maximize breathability. This makes them ideal for warmer temperatures (or riders who don’t want to have to blast their air conditioning during their Peloton workouts).
This model works to be both padded and loose at the openings by having an “inner short” with 3D padding – allowing for both high comfort and high breathability. This model has caused some reviewers to complain about riding up, however.
Read also: Best Padded Bike Seat Cover For Spinning
