Balance Bike vs. Training Wheels: Which is Right for Your Kid?

If you’re teaching a kid how to ride, you’re probably wondering about the best way to go about it.

If you’re Gen Z or older, then more likely than not you learned how to ride a bike using training wheels. However, since the mid-2000s, balance bikes have been rising in popularity as a way to teach kids how to ride a bike. The general idea of both methods is the same – teach someone to ride – but they execute this in two different ways: Training wheels teach you how to pedal & brake first whereas balance bikes teach you how to balance & turn first. Let’s dive into the specifics so that you can teach your little one how to ride in the best way for them!

Training Wheels

We’ve all seen plenty of kids riding bikes with training wheels before – they’re fun & easy to ride! However, do you think they’re outdated by now? Keep reading so that you can draw your own conclusions!

PROS:

Training wheels are classic – they’ve been around for a long time and for good reason! Here’s a few good reasons why they’ve stuck around:

Familiar: It’s probably what you learned how to ride on so you already know how they work. When teaching someone else a skill, it’s beneficial to rely on the way you had been taught.
Easy Breezy: With training wheels, it can be pretty difficult to tip the bike over since they’re there to stabilize the bike. The difficulty comes from turning the pedals over.
Braking: These bikes have brakes! Pedal bikes for little kids will usually either have a coaster brake (where you pedal backward to stop) or hand brakes (like the ones you’ll find on most adult bikes), so your child will have an easier time coming to a stop.

CONS:

It seems like bikes with training wheels are gradually being phased out of our neighborhoods. But before you get wrapped up in nostalgia, let me run you through some reasons why that might be the case:

Bad Habits: A bike with training wheels may feel a bit wobbly – that's because when training wheels are set up properly they should be a little be above the ground. This allows for your kid to practice balancing while the training wheels are there to catch them if they start leaning too far to one side, however, this can lead to your kid relying on those training wheels too much and make the transition to no training wheels really difficult.
Heavy: Training wheels take up a lot of space in your garage and out on the sidewalk. Plus, they make the bike quite heavy, which is frustrating for your kid when they struggle to get going and it’s frustrating for you when you have to carry it the rest of the way home if they give up on it.
Noisey: The plastic rattling against the metal of the bike can get super loud when you’re rolling down the street. This is not only annoying, but also distracting for you kid who is just trying to learn.

Balance Bike

Balance bikes are the hot new thing in the kids’ cycling scene, but are they really good or are they just trendy? Let me tell you their drawbacks & benefits and you can decide for yourself!

Pros:

As the name suggests, balance bikes teach you how to balance on a bike, which can be the most difficult thing to learn. Because of that, there’s a lot of great benefits your little rider can take advantage of.

Turning Naturally: Steering a bike isn’t merely a matter of turning the handlebars, you also need to be able to lean into the direction you’re turning. A balance bike allows you to lean in the same way you would on a regular bike which means your kid will be practicing their handling & cornering skills right from the get-go.
All-Terrain: Balance bikes are super lightweight & stripped down to just the essentials, which means they can handle a patch of grass or a bit of dirt road since there’s nothing to get bogged down by.
Accessible: Any bike can be a balance bike by simply taking the pedals off, which is great for older kids & adults that haven’t learned to ride just yet. While training wheels for bigger bikes do exist, they can get pretty expensive, This means that that converting whatever bike you have on hand into a balance bike is usually the most convenient way to teach someone how to ride a bike if they’ve owtgrown bikes that come with training wheels.

Cons:

Because balance bikes approach teaching bike riding by stripping a bike down to just two wheels & the frame between, that means some elements of learning how to ride cannot be learned using just a balance bike.

No Pedals: By design, balance bikes don’t have pedals. So when your kid does make the transition to a pedal bike, this can be an extra hurdle they’ll have to overcome. Some balance bikes are sold with conversion kits so that you can add pedals onto the same bike they learned how to balance on, making the transition easier.
No Brakes: Balance bikes, for the most part, don’t have any brakes at all, requiring your kid to use their feet to stop and potentially wear down their shoes faster. This can also be an issue if you live in an area with any big hills where they could gain a ton of speed and would need to come to a quick stop.

So which is the right choice for you & your kid?

At the end of the day, it’s only going to be a small amount of time that your kid is riding either a balance bike or a bike with training wheels – the goal is to get them riding a big kid bike and take them with you on more bike adventures! So the choice comes down to you. Many folks who teach kids how to ride agree that a balance bike instills confidence more quickly since kids can go fast & far from the get-go without being weighed down by clunky training wheels or cumbersome pedals. Having that confidence may be all your kid needs to get them rolling once it’s time for them to add those pedals into the equation. That being said, bikes with training wheels have been around for decades, so why bother reinventing the (training) wheel?

Your teaching methods are ultimately your choice since you’re going to know your kid better than anyone else, but it can be helpful to know what the research suggests. Though, due to their relative novelty, there isn’t a ton out there; the studies that do exist show that when kids start out using a balance bike, they tend to learn how to ride an actual bike at a younger age than if they start learning with training wheels. It’s definitely worth taking into consideration when deciding what to use to teach your kid how to ride a bike.