Do you feel safe ride at night? Does a headlight will help getting better visual? I'm looking at Niterider brand. Any recommendation?

Riding after traffic has thinned out can be safer in some places than riding in the light. At least if you have a light bright enough both to be seen by others and to see where you're going.

Don't bother with dimmer headlights. Dimmer is relative to your conditions and riding, but somewhere below 200 to 500 lumens is not worth buying these days when bright and compact lights are available relatively cheap. You'll find proponents here of shaped beams, so that more light goes across the road rather than evenly in all directions. You'll also find proponents of built-in batteries, external batteries, and generator based lights. All have their advantages.

My commutes home are always at night. I avoid riding at twilight or whenever drivers can't see because the sun is in their eyes. I also avoid riding during commute hours. After 7 there is less traffic. After 9 pm, the stores close and there is almost no traffic. My commutes are mostly in the suburbs so no heavy city traffic. I love riding at night and will average 16-17 mph so I hit 20 mph. I have 800-900 lumens on the handlebar and another 300-400 on the helmet. I ride the same roads every day or I would likely go a bit slower.

I commute in the South Bay between Menlo Park and Santa Clara. Most of the roads have street lights but I have a stretch on Stevens Creek Trail which is pitch black. I take that a bit slower and use the light on the helmet to watch for critters (or their eyes) on the side of the trail.

There are lots of threads about headlights here and the prices span cheap to expensive. I'm a fan of inexpensive because replacement costs are cheaper. Total investment for my front light setup is about $100. That includes two sets of 18650 batteries and a charger.

https://picasaweb.google.com/1078559...94109830288354

For rear lights, I have three blinkies. There are plenty of threads on blinkies. The 2W standard blinkies run about $30-40. There are plenty of threads on red blinkies.

If you just want casual night riding you might be able to get away with less bright lights. If you are going to put in a lot of hours of night riding, you should be prepared to invest in order to be safe.

This is a terrific headlight if you want to spend $80 or so: https://www.amazon.com/MagicShine-MJ-...magicshine+808

Or you can buy 4 of the imitation lights: RioRand 4 Mode 1200 Lumen CREE XML T6 Bulb LED Bicycle bike HeadLight Lamp Flashlight Light Headlamp | Amazon.com: Outdoor Recreation

Build quality is cheaper, battery life is less consistent but really, you can get 4 of them so who cares.

I don't know what you mean by your question - does a headlight help getting a better visual, so I'm guessing you are not a native english speaker. A headlight does TWO important things for you.
1) illuminates the road in front of you (and it needs to be very bright for this to work over 10 mph)
2) identifies you to other traffic.

When I ride with a headlight, cars respect my space better (I used to get right hooked, it rarely happens when I have a headlight, even in daylight). If you ride a LOT at night, use two headlights or at least carry a spare. Wear reflective clothing too, color is irrelevant at night but reflected light really identifies you as a human.

Well, I'm not convinced that bike headlights at my lbs will be brighten enough to see the road. These are like led flashlights. Unless, if I spend over $200, then I would feel satisfy.

Tell us:

• Do you have any head lights and tail lights now?
• Will you ride on urban streets, or quiet rural roads, or off-road?
• How long will your longest ride in the dark be?
• How fast will you ride?
• Will you ride with other cyclists or solo or both?
• What style bike will you ride?
• Will you ride one bike or different bikes on different rides?
• What is the most you will spend?

Answer to first question , Yes. but I dont live in the SF Metro Bay Area or San Jose Cal.


Looked at any of the posts that asked the same question?

I Found Nite rider, located in San Diego Cal, to give good service after the sale to their customers.

If you're riding on bike trails with oncoming traffic that's bikes and pedstrians right in front of you, I think the Phillips Saferide is the best battery light you can get:
https://www.amazon.com/Philips-SafeRi...llips+saferide

It has a cutoff like a car headlight, and an evenly shaped so, so it doesn't get into people eyes and a bright spot in the beam doesn't diminish your eyes ability to use the light (your eyes adjust to the brightest light around you, a light with a super bright spot causes your eyes to adjust and not use less bright light as well). If you buy one, the built in charger in the light is very good, but the batteries it comes with have a bad reputation - buy AA rechargeables like eneloops.

It's drawbacks are that it's not as wide as some other higher powered lights (though it's still pretty good), and it's runtime is 1.5 hours on high.

If you are not heading directly towards oncoming traffic on a trail, and instead your priority is flooding the road with light, I really like the Light And Motion Taz:
Light and Motion Taz 1200 Lumens Bike Light | Amazon.com: Outdoor Recreation

It also has very good light output, and throws out so much light it overcomes any bad lighting conditions for me, including the worst paths for bike lighting I've run across. The color temp and distribution of light it puts out is also very good, it looks very natural and it's easy to see with. Downside is mainly a lower runtime - 1.5 hours on high.

There are also numerous far, far cheaper lights on amazon as well, I'm just not as familiar with them. They usually put out crappier light quality, and you have to find out that doesn't have a bad hotspot, and they're not as reliable or waterproof. But, they're also 10x cheaper or something.

I feel far safer at night than I do during the day. I feel pretty safe at all times, but it's not even possible to not see me at night.

I've historically ridden with cheap Chinese lights, and I have no real beef with them. They work very well, especially for the money (< $30).

I just picked up a Cygolite Metro 550 and I really, really like it. I have not ridden with it at night yet, but as a daylight strobe it is quite good, and at 550 lumens and with a diffuser light making the beam oval it's almost certainly a pretty good nighttime light as well. I won't really know for sure how good it is until I do a winter run-down test to see how many minutes I get at winter temps (10*F down to -20*F)

In the name brand arena, the Metro 550 is a lot of light for the money.