A good bicycle bag should have a number of properties: it should be waterproof and easy and safe to assemble. Good visibility should also play a role. In the best case, the pannier bag has a few compartments on top in which objects can be stowed away clearly.
Stiftung Warentest tested 20 panniers, ten of them for everyday office use and ten for touring. All models were tested in the same way, but the weighting of the categories differs, for example the city bag does not have to be as rainproof as a touring bag – according to the testers from Stiftung Warentest.
The test winners at a glance: Vaude and Ortlieb win the race
The testers chose the city bags Augsburg III L by Vaude to the test winner. When driving to the office or going shopping, the bag stays sealed in the rain. The Vaude model also has an integrated laptop bag. Assembly is quick and easy by hand.
Among the touring bags, Stiftung Warentest can Ortlieb Back Roller High Visibility recommend for around 100 euros. The touring bag from Ortlieb scored particularly well in the categories of durability and waterproofness, safety and pollutants and received the top rating of “very good”. There were small point deductions in terms of handling.
You can find more details on the top recommendations and the test criteria of the Stiftung Warentest for bicycle bags in our detailed purchase advice.
In the following two tables you can see the city bags and touring bags from Stiftung Warentest, which were able to convince the experts the most.