Best bikepacking bags 2024 — how to choose lightweight luggage for cycling adventures

Best seatpack system: Wildcat Tiger Drover Saddle Harness — Buy Now for £72.00 from Wildcat

The Wildcat Tiger Drover Saddle Harness is designed to hold a drybag securely beneath your saddle, and makes for an incredibly secure and lightweight bikepacking setup. The design makes packing easy and quick, although the initial setup can take a while.

Tester Matt writes: “With everything installed, the overwhelming impression is how secure the bag is – there's virtually no side to side movement. Even when riding and purposefully trying to initiate some sway, it stays completely solid.

“With regular saddlepacks I usually remove the whole bag from the bike to pack effectively, but being able to leave the harness in place really speeds things up. Packing can be several minutes faster.

“When bikepacking there is little more frustrating than a saddle bag that is constantly swaying, and the Wildcat Tiger Drover Saddle Harness has that completely under control. It's a system that works well, makes packing easier and makes for a usefully faster getaway too.”

Pair it with the Wildcat Tapered Drybag and you've got a low-weight, sensibly-priced and brilliantly easy-to-use system.

Read our review of the Wildcat Tiger Drover Saddle Harness

Best frame-filling bag: Apidura Backcountry Full Frame Pack — Buy Now for £144.00 from Condor Cycles

The Apidura Backcountry Full Frame Pack is an excellent way to carry a lot of gear. It's easy to fit and use, is made from bombproof materials, is fully waterproof and carries a lifetime warranty – the price is high, but it's fair.

Tester Mike writes: “Loading it with an overnight's worth of water bladder, cooking gear, food and a jacket produces no noticeable bulging, despite the lack of an internal divider. As it's only 313g, I didn't bother removing the pack from my gravel bike for a few months. It gave me a huge amount of space for tools, clothing and food for day rides - popping to the shops for a litre of oatmilk, some wine and crisps never felt so much like going bush.

“If you want to keep a lot of kit stable, dry and secure no matter how long or arduous the journey, the Apidura Backcountry Full Frame Pack is a serious contender. The price is high end, but so are the performance and quality.”

Read our review of the Apidura Backcountry Full Frame Pack
Find an Apidura dealer

Best bar bag: Route Werks The Handlebar Bag — Buy Now for £165.00 from Route Werks

The Route Werks Handlebar Bag is a fabulous – and fabulously expensive – way to carry a plethora of stuff within easy reach on your bike. With great attention to detail, this is the benchmark by which all other bar bags must be judged.

With its volume of 3.2L and a max weight of 4kg, you can fit plenty of stuff in and on the bag. A metal frame and fittings holds a polymer lid and canvas body. Weighing 677g without accessory mounts fitted, it doesn't add much to your bike and at 235mm wide tucks in nicely between the hoods on the narrowest of drop bars.

Tester Mike writes: “My testing comprised many months bashing about the central Highlands, mostly at high speed with increasingly scant regard for the sensibilities of doing so on a bike with a loaded handlebar bag. I run 2.1in tyres and a 700mm-wide drop bar, so basically full-on rigid mountain biking, and the Route Werks bag just asked for more, please. Packed with jacket, gloves, food, tools, phone, GPS, lights and pump, everything stayed put and silent. I got so used to having absolutely everything in the bag and not in my pockets or on the bike's frame, I'm now ruined for any lesser luggage carrying setup.”

Read our review of the Route Werks The Handlebar Bag

Best top tube bag: Apidura Racing Long Top Tube Pack — Buy Now for £72.00 from Condor Cycles

The Apidura Racing Long Top Tube Pack squeezes two litres of flexible storage into a slim form factor with rock-solid fixings. Featuring a charging cable port and a two-way waterproof zip, it's hard to beat if you need to max out your storage for going fast, far or in between.

Tester Mike writes: “At 45cm, this is one of the longest top tube bags around. I ride an XL frame and most of the top tube gets taken up with its quick-access goodness. A potential downside of this is hitting your knees when full, but at 4.5cm wide it's in the Goldilocks zone for storage vs knee clearance.

“For an ostensibly simple item Apidura has packed in a number of tasty features to aid stability and usability. Out on the bike it doesn't disappoint, staying firmly put even when knocked by a wayward knee. The zip is stiff when new, and does loosen a bit, but remains firm and in place no matter the load or terrain. With a full load over the roughest of terrain at the fastest of speeds, there was nothing to distract me from rattling eyeballs and puckering trousers of impending doom. When excessive body language was required to keep things upright, on occasion a leg would contact the pack, but the secure fastening and stiff sides meant things returned to where they should be without issue.”

Read our review of the Apidura Racing Long Top Tube Pack
Find an Apidura dealer

Best money-no-object bikepacking bag: Tailfin AeroPack Carbon — Buy Now for £299.00 from Tailfin

The Tailfin AeroPack is about the neatest solution for adding some storage space to pretty much any bike. It'll appeal to a wide range of riders: bikepackers, ultraracers, credit-card tourers, audaxers, and anyone with a posh bike that they want to carry stuff on. Yes, it's expensive. And no, it's not as versatile as some other setups. But it does the job it's designed to do extremely well, and it's a lovely thing that's a joy to use.

Tailfin's main claim for the AeroPack is that it's 'The fastest way to carry gear – on any bike'. Partly that's an aerodynamic claim. The AeroPack design means that the bag is tucked away in the dirty air behind the rider, and the parabolic carbon arch that supports it is designed to cut cleanly through the air too. So it's more aero than a pannier sitting on a standard rack, and similar to a standard fabric seatpack.

Does that matter to you? In all probability, the answer is: not really, unless you're an ultra-racer and Tailfin isn't going to make its millions selling them just to ultraracers. WHere the Aeropack appeals is as a bag for your posh bike. There are not many bags of any size you'd want to attach to your posh road bike. For a start, your posh road bike maybe doesn't have rack mounts, so a rack is out. Even if it does, it's a pain to be taking a rack on and off if you do want a bit of luggage space. You might be tempted by a bikepacking-style seatpack, but they have their issues: they tend to swing about as they have very little structure, and they require careful packing to minimise that. Also, they don't really hold that much stuff.

The Aeropack scores on all counts here. There's the carbon arch keeping everything steady laterally, and inside the bag there's a lightweight alloy frame to give the whole thing structure. When you're riding, the AeroPack sits there anonymously. It's entirely rattle-free and impressively stiff. There's no lateral movement at all when you're out of the saddle, and most of the time you forget it's there at all. In terms of the experience of using it as luggage, it's easily better than a seatpack or a pannier on a standard rack.

Read our review of the Tailfin AeroPack Carbon

Wildcat Double Ended Drybag — Buy Now for £40.00 from Wildcat

Drybags are commonly used while bikepacking, allowing you to keep kit separated but also dry and they are available in a wide range of sizes and usually for not much money. The Wildcat Double Ended Drybag takes things a further and it is essentially two drybags inside each another. The bag features a double-ended opening and each end accesses a different bag section.

Each end accesses its own internal bag which is not joined to the other and is the same size or thereabouts as the outside at 13-litre. This means you can stuff a sleeping bag like the Alpkit Pipedream 600 in one end and use all the space conventionally or you can stuff a smaller bag , beanie and insulation jacket in one end AND a bivvy bag in the other. You don’t need to worry about packing each side evenly as they push up against each other as long as you make sure you have rolled the ends up securely to take up any excess.

Tester Matt writes: “I tested it with the Wildcat Lion handlebar harness. When mounted within the harness the extra thickness of the fabric is a big plus when riding through any trail obstructions such as brash or brambles that have the potential to damage or rip thinner drybag fabric. Despite the weight and cost disadvantages over regular drybags, it turns out to be incredibly useful. Once you have started using it, you’ll struggle to move away from it.”

Read our review of the Wildcat Double Ended Drybag

Vel Seat Pack 7L — Buy Now for £65.00 from Sigma Sports

The Vel Seat Pack is very well made, user friendly, and stable on the bike, and has a nifty air purge valve to make the most of its capacity. It's constructed using a tough Hypalon material, the same stuff that rigid inflatable boats are made from, and is highly durable and totally waterproof. It works really well.

Tester Stef writes: “I've found the pack really useful for carrying extra spares, tubes, clothing and food on winter rides; it's perfect for carrying an extra jacket for warmth at the coffee stop. It would also cope with an overnight B&B stop on a two-day credit card ride in summer; I loaded it up with the same items I took for a two-day ride I did in July last year, stuffing in a full set of summer cycling clothes, plus shorts and T-shirt for wearing in the evening. The air purge valve really helped to squeeze as much in as possible.

“I found the Vel Seat Pack to be a very user-friendly and well-made seatpack. It's ideal for long day rides, carrying extra food and tools, or wanting to take spare clothes or a jacket for a coffee stop, and has just enough space for a credit card overnighter in summer. I think it would stand up to years of use, and for £65 is really good value.”

Read our review of the Vel Seat Pack 7L

Brooks Scape Frame Bag — Buy Now for £85.00 from Wiggle

The Brooks Scape Frame Bag is a high-quality, waterproof pack that best fits slightly larger frames (think medium and upwards). It can carry plenty, making it ideal for day trips or longer bikepacking adventures, and there are plenty of pockets for separating items. A neat finishing touch is the handy cable port on the interior tech pocket, along with a port on the front of the outer fabric for charging or hydration.

We've reviewed and liked pretty much the entirety of the Brooks Scape range. This, the all-important frame bag, is the party piece if you're bikepacking, but it's also versatile enough to be useful for touring, day rides or commuting. It’s an excellent option for the money. If you're on the lookout for a top-quality frame bag with good carrying capacity that doesn't take up much frame space (and your frame is capable of accommodating it), then it's a great piece of gear.

Read our review of the Brooks Scape Frame Bag
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Wildcat Ocelot Frame Bag — Buy Now for £105.00 from Wildcat

The Wildcat Ocelot Frame Bag is a light, high quality bag available in a useful range of sizes. It's great in bad weather, the elasticated attachment works brilliantly and the whole thing has a premium, handmade feel. You won't get it on or off that quickly, though.

The Ocelot fixes to the top tube using an elastic cord that feeds through all the looped attachment points. It takes about 10 minutes to set up the first time, and it's not really a design for taking on and off on a regular basis. The benefit is excellent support – it doesn't sag like some bags with Velcro straps – and this in turn makes the zip really fluid and easy to use. Zip garages keep the pullers out of the way as you ride.

Tester Matt writes: “The Wildcat Ocelot for me outperforms many of its rivals by virtue of its elastic attachment, and also, to some degree, in its choice of fabrics. I really enjoy using it, and the clever fitting is a big part of that. If you're after a high quality, feature-packed frame bag that's at home in any weather, the Wildcat Ocelot is absolutely worth checking out.”

Read our review of the Wildcat Ocelot Frame Bag

Straight Cut Design Bagel Bar Bag — Buy Now for £70.00 from Straight Cut Design

The Straight Cut Bagel Bar Bag is small, perfectly made (by hand) and uses Voile's excellent Nano straps to give a rock-solid setup. The double zip is different from most similar bags and works really well.

Tester Matt writes: “The Bagel Bag has multiple attachment points and can be placed low enough to allow the use of out-front GPS mounts. It also has an elastic cord for looping around the head tube, although – unlike many similar bags – it's so secure on the Voile straps you may not need it. What really marks the Straight Cut Bagel Bar Bag out is its double zip opening. I was initially skeptical about what it would add, but was won over – Straight Cut says it allows easy access for left or right-handed riders, but found the zips generally very easy to open.

“The Bagel Bar Bag might be small, but it is the best handlebar bag I have used to date.The Voile straps give a solid fit, the fabric is strong and durable, and the zips are great. It's a great bag, and ideal for gravel bikes with limited space on the bars.”

Read our review of the Straight Cut Design Bagel Bar Bag