Best rear bike lights 2024 — boost your day & night visibility with a bright back light

Exposure's TraceR with ReAKT and Peloton rear light impressed us previously and in creating the new Boost-R, Exposure has taken the highly regarded Trace-R and doubled the runtimes while adding just 10g in weight. 

You get a beaming 80-lumen max output, with six modes that dictate how much burn time you have, from 6 hours in the brightest static mode to 48 hours on the lowest flash mode, plus DayBright pulse mode. 

ReAKT is probably the best feature of the lot, adapting to the light conditions at the time, and flaring up when it senses that the rider is braking. Additionally, the Peloton feature recognises when there is a front bike light behind you and dims itself to save dazzling the following rider. 

Most of the lights we review are more expensive than £15.99, and of those that are close, few are as bright. The ETC R65 USB Rear Light is a well-made and effective light that lasts well between charges and at full power, and is easily bright enough to be seen in daylight. 

The light has six modes, cycled with a single press, so it's easy to choose. You get high and low solid beams, two speeds of flash, a mode that combines very fast flashes with bursts of solid beam, and a smoothly rising and falling pulse.

ETC doesn't claim any run-times, but in the solid 65-lumen mode it lasts around 90 minutes, and everything else runs usefully longer than that – flashing mode is easily good for a typical week's commuting, and unless you're running that full power solid mode it's dependably fit-and-forget rather than charge-every-ride.

The Gemini Juno 100 is a simple, easy to use rear light with few frills, but it does pack some useful features, including a 30 COB (chip-on-board) LED lighting array that's super-bright without melting eyeballs, and a clip mount that allows it to be attached on or off the bike in a variety of ways.

The oval arrangement of LEDS gives the light a distinctive shape that certainly stands out from the usual lighting crowd, and thanks to the ability to rotate around its base 90 degrees, it can be orientated either in line with your seatpost, or perpendicular to it.

The curved lens also gives the light decent side visibility as well, which is a bonus. Although 100 lumens max might not sound as powerful as some, even in bright daylight it really stands out – I honestly don't think you need any more than this to stand out, unless you want to be really obnoxious.

The Exposure Link DayBright MK2 is a very well made helmet light that lives up to the company's reputation for quality.

It's a secondary helmet light that adds 360-degree visibility and is great for being seen in heavy traffic. Designed and made in the UK, build quality is excellent with a solid feeling mount and run-times are reasonable bearing in mind its size and two LEDs.

As a secondary light for adding dimensionality to your visibility, for being seen rather than to see by, the Link does the job and the output is up there with the best we've seen in a small light - the maximum output is 200 lumens at the front and 40 at the rear.

The Kryptonite Incite XR USB Rear light is well suited to being your weekday commuting bike light thanks to a solid run-time, easy operation and good side visibility.

The Incite XR has five modes lasting for around 20 hours in the high steady flash mode and up to 36 hours in eco mode. 

Usually, we see the brightness of bike lights measured in lumens. Kryptonite measures its rear lights in Lux and this Incite XR is given a value of 0.06. In real terms, I found the Incite XR to be perfectly bright enough for city commuting.

Do you really need a 250 lumen rear light? Probably not in most circumstances, but the option is there with Lezyne's Zecto Drive Max 250. 

Of course there are loads of less bright settings and there are five flashing modes in total - i the 35 lumen mode it can last a full 24 hours, at least a fortnight's worth of commuting for most of us. 

While the high visibility is this light's main USP, it's also very solidly built and should last you years. Our reviewer's only real criticisms were that it's not cheap, and that it might even be too bright!

Neither cheap nor expensive, Giant's Recon is worth every penny if you value brightness, reliability and good run times. It's also waterproof, durable and easy to use. 

This compact light is great for day or night, and it kicks out 200 lumens on the max setting. 270 degrees of visibility thanks to two strips in the side of the light unit ensures you're visible to motorists approaching from side streets. 

You can mount it vertically or horizontally, and charging is via USB. There are seven modes to choose from, and even the high flash mode provides an impressive six hours of run time. 

If your budget is tighter or you simply don't need this much brightness and extra settings, we also highly recommend the Giant Recon TL 100.