The Best Exercise Bikes on Amazon Canada of 2024

Schwinn's IC4 Indoor Cycling Bike is our “hack” pick for a quality exercise bike that you can use alone or by outfitting with a tablet to stream workouts from a separate app. The bike has Bluetooth connectivity, so it can be paired with your own tablet, smartphone, monitor, or smart TV to stream workouts from apps like Peloton and Zwift, and the included media rack offers a secure perch for your handheld device. The IC4 offers variable mechanical resistance and cadence tracking in RPM, like many of the other connected bikes we tested, which it displays on a small backlit digital display. However, only the bike's cadence data beams into the Peloton app, so you won't see how you're doing on the leaderboard, though you'll at least have a log that you took a class. (With Zwift, you'll have better data integration, including a record and display of cadence, power, and heart rate in the app.)

We like that the IC4 bike comes with helpful accessories like a pair of three-pound dumbbells, a Bluetooth heart-rate monitor, and a USB charging station, all of which contribute to its value for the price. Schwinn offers an in-home assembly servicefor $129, but we found the bike easy to build without any paid help. The handlebars and seat are adjustable for riders of heights 4 feet 6 inches to 6 feet 6 inches, and it has a weight limit of 330 pounds. The pedals come with cages or can be used with SPD-cleat cycle shoes.

Overall, the bike works well when connected with other devices and apps. On occasion, we had a few minor issues with streaming when paired with the Peloton app and found it best to preload workouts ahead of time to avoid glitches during class. Also, though both the Peloton and Schwinn bikes use 100 units of resistance, the levels aren’t equivalent—the resistance is heavier on the IC4 than the Peloton, so you have to modify what the instructor calls out. If you don’t want to remember the conversions off the top of your head, you can buy a decal on Etsy to stick on your bike (or just write numbers down on a sticky note). You also won't get a very detailed log of your rides as the Schwinn itself doesn't store them, so if you want to track your overall data, you'll have to write it down from the display at the end of your workout. One thing we don’t love about riding the IC4 is the very firm seat, which we haven’t gotten used to after more than a month of riding, though adding a seat cushion may help.

The real reason someone might opt for the Schwinn hack, of course, is the lower cost. To make it "connected," you’ll have to add a phone or tablet or set it up in front of a smart TV, and you’ll need a subscription to an app—Peloton’s costs $16.99 a month for each account (so if two people will use it, that’s two accounts to pay for).

The NordicTrack S22i bike offers a tantalizing premise for restless cyclists: the ability to ride at home while feeling like you’re biking somewhere out in the open. This is possible through iFit, the app offered through NordicTrack’s bikes (and other connected exercise equipment), which features classes taught as guided scenic rides in which instructors lead you through trails in Colorado, Japan, and more. The scenic rides are truly special, with camerawork that makes you feel like you’re really wherever the screen is showing you—so much so that when an instructor rode over a root, I braced myself for an impact that didn’t come. If you’re someone who doesn’t love the traditional studio-cycling class model, it could make the S22i worth it for you.

The bike automatically adjusts its electromagnetic resistance, like the Peloton Bike+, as well as incline, something that isn’t offered on any other bike we tried along with the trail. This gives the sessions a more natural feel than turning a knob—though you can also adjust the resistance and incline on your own with buttons on the handlebars. All the instructors I experienced were great, and iFit also offers studio cycling classes and cross-training classes including yoga, HIIT, and Pilates. The bike also comes with a pair of three-pound dumbbells and a 22-inch touch screen that tilts and rotates 360 degrees for off-bike classes, though we sometimes found the screen rotated a little too much, as well as shook during hard pedalling. iFit also has live classes, accessible through an “On Air” button on the home screen, and offers treadmill, bike, rower, elliptical, and strength classes several times a day. All classes have a leaderboard—and, like Peloton, thousands of people who take them, so you may find yourself lost in a sea of usernames, and your chances of getting a shout-out are pretty slim (though it’s possible to hide the leaderboard if you don’t want to see it). However, iFit also has a pre-live class “waiting room,” where you can check-in and send the instructor questions before class, which helps boost a sense of community.

The bike—and iFit—have some snags, however. The first, for us, was assembly. NordicTrack is currently not offering in-home assembly, so we did it ourselves ... and struggled. This is partially because the job fell to one person and NordicTrack recommends that two do it, and partially because there were some small malfunctions in the parts we received that required maneuvering and calls to customer service to figure out. (On the plus side, customer service was great, and it seems the issue was a random fluke, not something that happens regularly.) Without the weird malfunction, and with two people to set it up, it would almost certainly be easier. Once set, you have a bike that fully adjusts to fit riders from 4 feet, 10 inches to 6 feet, 10 inches and up to 350 pounds.

Another concern is that the pedals that come with the bike don’t allow any kind of shoe to clip in, and the seat included is pretty stiff and uncomfortable. Both can be swapped out (or padded), but if you’re someone who doesn’t want to take the time (and money) to do this, you may be better served with a bike that comes with a comfier seat and clip-in pedals. iFit’s interface is also a little confusing, both on the bike and a tablet because it has extra content like TedTalks and meditation sessions and lumps them all together without an easy way to filter things out. So, to find a ride or HIIT class, you have to sift through a bunch of other stuff. Most of the classes tended to be on the longer side at about 40 minutes to an hour, too, and it’s hard to find anything shorter than a 20-minute session—not bad for overall health, but not great if you just want to add a five-minute ab class to something else, or only have time for a 10-minute workout.

The Echelon EX-5 is the closest option you can get to a Peloton without paying the price of a Peloton. The bike itself costs about $500 less than the Peloton Bike+, and users can also purchase an Echelon United Monthly subscription which includes live and on-demand bike classes with additional workouts, such as HIIT, pilates, and more.The classes can be streamed via the Echelon app on your device of choice or on the 180 degree-rotating bike screen, with five users permitted per account.

Instructors teach out of Echelon studios in Chattanooga and Miami, and the classes are fun, engaging, and an overall good workout. Compared to the Peloton, the quality of both the bike and the video isn’t as good and the community of bikers is much smaller (though that also increases your likelihood of getting personal shout-outs during live classes, which typically have about 50 participants). The bike, which is rated for riders up to 297 pounds (the same as Peloton but less than others that go up to 350), felt less stable than other bikes, and we noticed some shaking of the tablet during higher intensity pedaling. On the plus side, the seat and handlebars are fully adjustable, and riders from 4 feet 5 inches to 6 feet 11 inches will find a fit. The pedals also come with cages so you can ride with your regular sneakers, or you may clip in with SPD-cleat cycling shoes. Like the Peloton, the screen shows your cadence, resistance, and output, so you know exactly how hard you are working. Throughout classes, instructors suggest the cadence and general resistance should aim for, but more often than not, they say to be at a “moderate,” “challenging,” “hard,” or “all-out” level, allowing users to go at their own intensity.

Compared to others we tried, it’s no surprise that the Sunny SF-B901 bike ended up in last place—with its chunky steel frame rated for riders up to 275 pounds (the least of all we tested), a 40-pound mechanical flywheel for resistance, and not much else, it’s about as basic as a studio-type cycle gets. It has no Bluetooth connectivity or extra features, and if you want to use it with an app like Peloton with your tablet or phone, you’ll have to buy a holder to keep it in place and you won’t get any feedback from the bike to the tablet. The bike we tried also did not have a water bottle holder, though Sunny sells some variations that do.

That said, it costs a fraction of every other bike we tried, and for the price, it’s not a bad buy. It’s available with a chain or belt drive—the chain drive is usually less expensive and thus more popular, so that’s the one we tested. It made a slight grinding sound when we pedalled and never felt like a totally smooth range of motion. And, no surprise, the pedals are outfitted with cages for regular shoes, not cycling cleats. We also thought the resistance knob was hard to twist and didn’t seem to have much room between very light and very heavy, which is annoying for workouts that require nuance (i.e., most app ones).

On the other hand, the seat was surprisingly comfortable, and the bike itself is easy to adjust—you can move the seat up and down and fore and aft and change the handlebar height and reach to fit riders with inseams ranging from 30 inches to 42 inches (we’re not sure how that translates to height, either).

If we hadn’t been fresh off an expensive Peloton bike, we probably would have found the Sunny fine enough. Some Amazon reviewers swear by using it with the Peloton app, once a tablet holder is added to the bike—so, if you don’t want to spend a ton of money on an exercise bike but still want to get some indoor cardio, the Sunny is a suitable vessel.