Best cheap cycling shoes 2023 — get road or mountain bike shoes for under £70

Looking for the best cheap cycling shoes? Welcome to our guide to the best SPD and road cycling shoes for under £70.

• Shoes with stiff soles and soles that accommodate clipless pedals start around £30

• Choose between mountain bike-style ('SPD') walkable shoes with a recessed pocket for the cleat and racier shoes that put the cleat on the outside of the sole

• Race-style shoes are stiffer for better power-transmission, mountain bike-style shoes have more flexible shoes for walking

• Most cheap cycling shoes use laces or Velcro straps to close them

The best cheap cycling shoes

• Cheap SPD shoes
  • Triban RC 100 road shoes — £34.99
  • Muddyfox Tour 100 Low Cycling Shoes — £37.99
  • Triban RC 500 — £44.99 - £49.99
  • Giro Berm — £63.99
• Cheap road shoes
  • Shimano RC100 — £53.99
  • Northwave Core Road Shoes — £49.99
  • dhb Dorica — £40.00
  • Shimano RP1 — £39.99
  • Muddyfox RBS100 shoes — £37.99
  • Van Rysel 500 road shoes — £49.99

Cycling shoes have stiffer soles than, say, trainers or running shoes, which makes them more comfortable to pedal in. You can pay hundreds of pounds for high-tech shoes with carbon fibre soles, but you can get perfectly usable shoes for under £70.

As Mat Brett discusses at length in our article covering everything you need to know about cycling shoes, there are broadly two types of cycling shoes: road racing style and SPD/mountain bike style.

SPD/mountain bike style shoes have a small cleat (a special stud) recessed into the sole. They're easier to walk in than road racing shoes and because the pedals are usually double-sided they're easier to get into. They're the way to go if you want to get started with clipless pedals.

Road racing shoes have stiff, smooth soles with threaded holes for a cleat that stands proud from the shoe and fits into the attachment mechanism on a matching pedal. They're efficient and secure, but there's a learning curve to getting in to the usually single-sided pedals and the shoes are hard to walk in.

Let's see what we can find by way of shoe bargains.

Cheap SPD shoes

Triban RC 100 road shoes — £34.99

These from French-based sport store chain Decathlon look like a bargain entry point when it comes cheap cycling shoes. They're billed as road shoes, but have a two-bolt mounting for mountain bike-style cleats, so you'll be able to walk in them easily.

Muddyfox Tour 100 Low Cycling Shoes — £37.99

Just under forty quid is the starting price for cycling shoes and these from Sports Direct brand Muddyfox are typical of what you'll find. You get a padded mesh fabric body, with laces and Velcro strap to cover the knot and lace ends and a cushioned heel outsole for walking.

Triban RC 500 — £44.99 - £49.99

The latest shoes from Decathlon, these have a two-bolt sole for mountain bike style cleats so you can walk in them easily. They look just the job for touring, commuting and even club runs. They're also available in all black, or with blue or red in place of orange.

Giro Berm — £63.99

A shoe that seems to have lots of happy users, with reviewers citing the roomy toebox and stiff-but-not-too-stiff sole as advantages for one and off bike use.

Cheap road shoes

Shimano RC100 — £53.99

Straightforward synthetic leather shoes from Shimano with a three-strap closure and a fibreglass-reinforced sole set up for three-bolt cleats such as Shimano's own SPD-SL system and Look, among others.

Northwave Core Road Shoes — £49.99

Carbon-fibre reinforced soles for stiffness and low weight are very nice things to find on shoes that cost under £60 a pair. Northwave has been making cycling shoes for literally decades so these three-strap shoes may be entry-level but they won't be low-rent.

dhb Dorica — £40.00

Lace-up road shoes are achingly trendy and practical too thanks to the ability to fine-tune the tension right across your foot. The synthetic upper is well assembled, the stitching feels quality and the overall impression is of a more expensive shoe. There are many ventilation holes along the top, and muted dhb logos side and rear.

This road version will take SPD cleats, but there's a version with a proper walkable SPD sole for the same money.

Read our review of the dhb Dorica shoes

Shimano RP1 — £39.99

Owners seem very happy with their RP1 shoes, praising the fit, comfort, sole stiffness and faff-free two-strap closure. The sole gets its stiffness from fibreglass reinforcement and there's a reflective patch on the back for visibility. They're compatible with two-bolt SPD and three-bolt Look-style cleats.

Muddyfox RBS100 shoes — £37.99

These budget road shoes from Muddyfox are available in a white and black colour scheme and have a three-strap closure, with a very broad strap across the top to spread the tension over your foot, and Amazon reviewers say the sole is plenty stiff. For just £38, they do the job.

Van Rysel 500 road shoes — £49.99

With a fibreglass-reinforced nylon sole and classic trio of Velcro straps, these road shoes from Decathlon look to be very good value. They'll take either three-bolt cleats or two-bolt SPD cleats.

Explore the complete archive of reviews of shoes on road.cc