People decide what bike they want by what looks good. Then they ride it twice and put it in the shed, because it turns out a bike built for a mountain is hard work on the road to work.

The question is not which bike is best. It is where you are going to ride it. Answer that first and the rest is easy.

What is a mountain bike for?

Rough ground: tracks, woods, muddy paths, anything with rocks and roots. Wide knobbly tyres for grip, flat handlebars for control, and often suspension at the front to soak up bumps. On tarmac all of that works against you. The tyres drag, the suspension bounces, and it takes more effort to go the same speed as everything else.

That said, a lot of people ride mountain bikes on the road, and they are fine for it if you are not going far. They are tough, they are comfortable, and they cope with potholes and kerbs. A cheap mountain bike with the tyres pumped up hard is a perfectly good bike for getting about.

If it has suspension, check it works. A cheap suspension fork that has seized is worse than no suspension at all, because it is heavy and does nothing.

What is a road bike for?

Going fast on tarmac, and going a long way. Thin smooth tyres, dropped handlebars, no suspension, and as light as possible. It is the quickest sort of bike there is on a good road, and the least comfortable sort everywhere else. A pothole that a mountain bike shrugs off can put a road bike’s wheel out of true.

You sit bent over on a road bike, which is faster but harder on your back and your wrists if you are not used to it. It is not a bike for popping to the shops with a bag of shopping.

If you are buying one second-hand, the wheels are where the money is. Spin them and look for wobble before you look at anything else.

What is a hybrid for?

Everything in between, which for most people is everything. A hybrid has flat handlebars like a mountain bike, so you sit upright and can see where you are going, with smoother and narrower tyres like a road bike, so it rolls easily on tarmac. It is the bike for getting to work, going to the shops, and riding along a trail at the weekend.

If you are not sure what you want, you want a hybrid. It is not the best at anything, and it does not need to be.

Most hybrids will take mudguards and a rack, which is what makes them useful day to day. If you are going to ride to work in the rain, that matters more than anything else on this page.

Mountain bike, hybrid and road bike compared by what they are built for, their tyres, their handlebars, what they are bad at, and whether they take a rack and mudguards.
	Mountain bike	Hybrid	Road bike
Built for	Rough ground: tracks, woods, roots and rocks	Roads, lanes and trails. Most everyday riding	Going fast, and going far, on tarmac
Tyres	Wide and knobbly, for grip	In between: smoother and narrower than a mountain bike	Thin and smooth, for speed
Handlebars	Flat, for control	Flat, so you sit upright and can see	Dropped, so you can tuck down
Bad at	Tarmac. The tyres drag and it takes more effort	Nothing badly, and it is not the best at anything either	Potholes, kerbs, comfort and carrying things
Rack and mudguards	Sometimes	Usually, which is what makes it useful day to day	Rarely

If you are not sure which column you are in, you are in the middle one.

What about the other sorts?

A BMX is for tricks and short bursts, not for going anywhere, because the small wheels and single gear make it hard work over distance. A folding bike is for trains and small flats. A gravel bike is a road bike with room for fatter tyres, for people who want to ride fast on rough lanes. An electric bike is any of these with a motor to help, and it changes what is possible for anyone who finds hills hard.

How do you decide?

Answer these three questions honestly and the bike picks itself.

Where will most of the riding be? Not the riding you imagine doing. The riding you will actually do, most weeks. If the answer is tarmac, you do not need a mountain bike, however good they look.

How far? Under about five miles, almost anything will do and comfort is what matters. Over that, weight and rolling speed start to count, and you will want narrower tyres.

Will you carry things? A bag of shopping, a change of clothes, a child seat. If yes, you want somewhere to fit a rack, and that rules out most road bikes and a lot of mountain bikes.

The short version

Rough ground: mountain bike
Fast and far on tarmac: road bike
Everything else, and if you are not sure: hybrid
Decide by where you will actually ride, not where you would like to
Carrying things means a rack, and a rack means a hybrid

Around here, most of that riding ends up on the Tarka Trail, which is flat and surfaced, and which a hybrid suits better than anything else.

Whatever sort it is, try it before you buy it. Ten minutes on the right kind of bike tells you more than an hour of reading.

Mountain bike, hybrid or road bike: which do you actually need?