Looking for some breathable + waterproof gear, have a light weight jacket from eddie bauer but it is still very much sweaty even with pit zippers, as I bike over time, wondering if anyone else has a better product for the rain to cover at least my upper body

I have a waterproof breathable parka shell that I bought in the early '90s for skiing, it was still not enough, I needed the pit zips and upper back zip vents, glad it had them, plus good wicking layer and fleece, so never got soggy, would dry out fast in the lodge. WB is enough for me for low activity level, but not high, and biking is a lot higher activity level for me than downhill skiing.

GoreTex and eVent are generally the standards but in the end most of that stuff cannot really truly keep up with cycling as well. Maybe if you are a light sweater but I am not. I recommend something that is quick to dry and wicks moisture well for summer rains or something waterproof that has lots of mechanical venting and understand you might get wet. In winter time I usually wear my waterproof DRY/Q Elite jacket from Mountain Hardware from their no-Gore-Tex days. It is decently breathable-ish not great but again nothing really is.

Breathable and waterproof are opposites.
If you are not into competitive performance a rain cape will certainly allow ample ventilation and keep you free of rain.

I have and like this: https://cleverhood.com/collections/capes-2
The Urbanaut has arm holes, heavier gauge fabric, and is a touch bigger for a given size than the Rover. It is high quality gear intended for a lifetime of service. If you are super savvy, you can wait for a %-off sale. But, those can be sort of rare. It may be one of those things where it might be better to just bite the bullet and pay full price. A buy once, cry once, sort of thing.

Cycling Jackets | GOREWEAR US

I wore full Gore-Tex cycling outfits (jacket and pants) years ago while bike camping in Nova Scotia, where it rains and/or is extremely foggy just about every day. Gore-Tex kept me dry and comfortable. Pricy, yes, but you get what you pay for.

Nothing.

Gore Tex and the microfiber alternatives all can keep you dry from rain at about any temperature, but you will sweat at temps above maybe 55 deg. F.

That's about everyone's experience with any so-called breathable and waterproof gear. You still likely need to carry top and bottoms for a tour, as you sometimes can sweat a but but want the wind off you in the rain else you get hypothermic. So carrying and using becomes a necessary evil.

You need the biggest hugest pitzips, like waist to wrist. I have a great backpacking coat like that, it also folds down to a size that would fit in your pants pocket. Note that it is not breathable at all, it is just truly ventilated in a way that no 'breathable' coat can approach.

For cycling I use an old showers pass coat, some model they don't make any more. It has B+/A- pitzips (if the above coat has A+) Their coats are not cheap but they are on sale right now for like the rest of today. For cycling I really don't want a hood, but that is the only negative to the Lightheart coat linked above. Oh, plus no cellphone pocket. Also, the showers pass coat has a back 'exhaust' vent which works great when I am using panniers but not with a backpack.

GoreTex ShakeDry was absolutely amazing and performed much like a nylon windbreaker in its ability to breathe. Unfortunately, it was deemed a risk to our very way of living and we were forced to return to a clammy existence going forward. Fortunately, I purchased an extra for myself and my wife and stored it in a cool, dark place for the future.

Ditto on the remarks about most "waterproof" jackets being sweaty, if you can't get sufficient airflow. There's no real way around that, in my experience.

Gore-Tex, Artex and other fabrics are nice. But there's a limit to how much transfer of moisture outward can occur while blocking inward moisture movement.

About the best I've found: a high-grade, thin base layer with exceptional wicking properties, and a decent 2.5- or 3-layer Artex cycling rain jacket. Showers Pass makes a few. (Have the Showers Pass Transit, with a 3-layer Artex fabric, taped seams. Nicely made.) Huge pit zips, a big zippered back vent. With big zippered pit vents, and a big back vent, it allows a great amount of airflow. Which requires it to be not raining much, in order for me to want to open up the zips that much. If I can't, or if the external temps are above the mid-60s or so, it can get hot and clammy inside. A high-grade base layer made with an exceptional wicking material helps with this. Most jackets seem to roughly approximate this sort of performance, more or less.

https://showerspass.com/collections/mens-rain-jackets

To quote Independence Day, "That's not entirely accurate." But for the purpose of this thread, it may be close enough. "Goretex" (waterproof breathable membrane), is (IIRC) teflon sheet that has been very precisely stretched to yield gazillions of microholes that are large enough for water vapor to pass through, but water liquid, not. In my experience, there is not enough breathability for high activity sports, and that may be due to the limited size of the holes, or insufficient "fresh" air inside the coat, thus the air inside becomes saturated and cannot hold more air in solution (humidity), which is how it works because the water is not boiling off, it's evaporating into air which will then be vented out of the jacket. So yeah, for me, I need physical vents.

Someone mentioned microfiber; I forgot about that. In the '90s I gave my brother an expensive microfiber windbreaker, the water would just bead off immediately, he said it was awesome. I cannot recall if it had a membrane liner. He didn't do anything high activity, just walking to school or work.

Shakedry was awesome. Sadly I lost mine when I left a backpack on a bus. Between decent breathability and the ability to zip up from the bottom, it was pretty darned good for all day riding in the rain. Fragile though. I'm looking at the Pearl Izumi NeoShell WxB as a replacement.

For commuting, a rain cape plus fenders will keep you dry from the knees up, unless it's windy when it's more like waist up. They are a bit of a parachute, if speed is a concern. Sweat isn't a problem though.

I knew a randonneuring tandem couple who had a custom tandem rain cape they wore for rainy PNW rides.

Pretty impressed with The North Face Futurelight rain jackets being the most breathable/water-proof rain gear I know of. Every time I've used it, I hit a point where I'm just about ready to take it off, it begins to release sweat vapor through the material. Futurelight is the only fabric I've ever used that truly transferred vapor out before I overheat. Really light weight, too thin for heavy duty activity. It's something rock climbers or joggers or ultra-light backpackers would use. Probably too light duty for tour cyclists or off road riders.

I loved my J & G rain jacket, I bought two of them around 2009 ish. Hiring a local seamstress to reproduce one.

They check my boxes: long pit zips, two way main zipper ( you can unzip it from the bottom for ventilation), vented back, longer in the back, no seams above the chest two pockets, adjustable wrists, and last but not least no hood.