For a little extra carrying capacity when riding, a top tube bag can make a handy addition to your road bike or gravel bike. It’s also a useful component of a bikepacking bag set, adding a litre or so of easy-to-reach capacity, dependent on the bag you choose.
Front end bags used to offend the purists, but the rise of gravel riding and bikepacking, along with their use by triathletes, has made top tube bags a useful adjunct. Even more than a bar bag, a top tube bag provides easy access to food or a phone when riding.
Top tube bag bolting points are common on the best gravel bikes and they’re increasingly a feature of endurance bikes and all-road bikes, although you can still mount a top tube bag with straps if you don’t have these. Many top tube bags offer both straps and bolt holes in their base, although some brands sell two variants, so you can have one or the other but not both.
As well as small top tube bags with around a litre of capacity, there are longer options which can extend the carrying capacity to as much as 2 litres, adding a significant amount of extra carrying room. In most cases, the bags are narrow, typically under 5cm in width, to avoid them getting in the way when riding.
So if you’re looking for a top tube bag to add to your bikepacking bag set-up or supplement a saddle bag, or just to carry a few extra energy gels on your ride, here are our picks.
Our pick of the best top tube bags
- Alpkit Fuel Pod: RRP £39.99
- Apidura Expedition: RRP £44
- Blackburn Outpost: RRP £55
- Brooks Scape: RRP £49.99
- Evoc Top Tube Pack WP: RRP £37.99
- Lezyne Aero Energy Caddy: RRP £36
- Miss Grape Node: RRP €72
- Ortlieb Toptube-Bag: RRP £77
- Topeak Fastfuel Bag Essential: RRP £25
- Restrap Race Top Tube Bag – Long: RRP £74.99
- Zefal Z Adventure T1: RRP £26
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Why trust Cyclist’s advice?
We’re not just fair weather roadies here at Cyclist, we also head off on long gravel rides for our magazine features, often somewhere hot, dry and remote. That means carrying plenty of extra stuff, so a top tube bag is a great addition to carry an extra gel or two to help get us to the end of a tough ride.
We’re not paid by sponsors and all the products we recommend are picked on their merits and based on our combined years of experience riding in all conditions, so you can trust us to be impartial.
Best top tube bags 2025
Alpkit Fuel Pod
£39.99 | View offer
Alpkit makes a whole range of bikepacking bags, which are well priced and robust, including over ten top tube options. We like this UK-made Fuel Pod. It's available in three sizes which extend progressively further along your top tube: 0.75 litre, 1 litre and 1.5 litre. There are also four colours on offer, as well as a 1.25 litre extra-long version and a rear top tube bag. Surprisingly, all three sizes of the standard Fuel Pod are the same price.
The design is straightforward and made of an organic cotton face fabric with a recycled polyester waterproof backing. It's foam lined to protect valuables and there's a waterproof YKK zipper with a large puller that's easy to use, although the seams are non-taped. The front of the bag includes a cable port.
- Buy now from Alpkit (£39.99)
Apidura Expedition
From £44 | View offer
Apidura is a big name in bike luggage and makes three different lines of bags, one aimed at gravel racers, one for MTB use and this Expedition pack for use for day rides or as part of a larger set of bikepacking bags. There are strap-on and bolt-on designs available and it comes in 0.5 litre and 1 litre sizes. The 4.5cm width means it's less likely to interfere with your pedalling.
Apidura welds the seams, as well as using waterproof three layer laminate fabric and a waterproof zip with a large puller, so the pack is likely to be more water resistant than the Alpkit option. Apidura includes a cable port and reflective graphics too. It reckons that the smaller pack will hold a few gels, while with the larger size you can add a phone and power bank.
Blackburn Outpost
£55 | View offer
The Outpost top tube bag is available in a single 0.5 litre size. It's a little wider than some at 8cm and also a little heavier at 185g, but it incudes bolt holes as well as straps. The top tube bag is padded inside and there's a zipped side pocket which could be used for a credit card or cash, as well as a mesh slip pocket for a phone on the top of the bag.
The fabric is water resistant, although not seam sealed and the zip is also not fully waterproof. The wide aperture, thanks to a zip that goes all around the top of the bag does mean that your contents are very easily accessible though.
- Buy the Blackburn Outpost Top Tube Bag from Tweeks Cycles (£40)
Brooks Scape Top Tube Bag
£49.99 | View offer
Brooks' bike luggage offers a range of bags, including this 0.9 litre capacity top tube option with strap mounts. Weighing 100g, there's a waterproof zip, with welded seams and internal padding, as well as a front hole for a cable. The 4cm width is narrow enough not to get in the way when riding.
Brooks also sells a bolt-on version and a long strap-on variant which is 37cm long and increases the capacity to 2.5 litres.
Evoc Top Tube Pack WP
£37.99 | View offer
Evoc's waterproof top tube bag has a 0.8 litre capacity and weighs 90g. It's relatively narrow at 5cm wide and offers either bolt-on or strap mounts. It comes with protective strips to stop your frame from getting scratched.
The fabric and the zip are waterproof, there are welded seams and the zip is designed for one-handed operation. Inside, there's a mesh organiser pocket. Reflective logos help keep you more visible in low light.
Lezyne Aero Energy Caddy
£36 | View offer
Lezyne makes a range of Energy Caddy top tube bags, with different capacities, while the Smart Energy Caddy has a phone sleeve built into it. All feature waterproof fabric and zips and can either be strapped or bolted to the bike frame.
The Aero Energy Caddy has a streamlined shape and at 4cm is narrow, but still offers 0.7 litres capacity, which Lezyne states should be enough for a range of gels and bars plus an inflator or, if you're that way inclined, 3.5 doughnuts.
Miss Grape Node
€72 | View offer
Italian brand Miss Grape makes a Road range as well as an Adventures range, both of which offer a top tube bag as part of a complete set of bikepacking luggage. The Node is part of the Road range and offers a shorter version, as well as the Big Node, which is longer and holds 1.8 litres. Both come in a strap-on version, as well as a variant with two bolt holes for bikes with top tube mounting points.
Miss Grape focuses on the low weight of under 100g and narrow 4.8cm width, designed to minimise the risk of rubbing on your knees as you ride. Although the fabric is robust and weather resistant, the Node bag isn't taped and the zip isn't waterproof, so you'll want to use a dry bag or polythene bag inside to keep anything delicate dry if you're riding in the wet.
- Buy now from Miss Grape (€72)
Ortlieb Toptube-Bag
£77 | View offer
Ortlieb makes two top tube packs, the 1 litre capacity Fuel-Pack and the 1.5 litre Toptube-Bag. Both offer easy access to contents via a flap closure secured by magnets and can be mounted to the frame via rubber straps or bolts. There's an offset plate available if your frame's bolt holes don't line up with the holes in the underside of the pack.
The two packs differ as the top of the more expensive Toptube-Bag has rubber corner clips to allow you to fix a mobile phone to its outside. The Toptube-Bag also includes a separate mounting plate, so it can be clipped on and off the bike quickly, although this is absent in the Fuel-Pack.
Topeak Fastfuel Bag Essential
£25 | View offer
Topeak's Fastfuel Bag Essential is designed not to disrupt the airflow over your top tube. At 4cm, it's also narrow but still holds 0.4 litres. Best for a few gels, it has a single compartment and can be mounted in two positions via its anti-scratch part-elastic straps.
If the Essential pack is a bit too small for you, there's a whole range of other top tube bags from Topeak, including the Bento Pack, which has a transparent phone sleeve on its top, while other packs have up to 1 litre capacity.
Restrap Race Top Tube Bag - Long
£74.99 | View offer
Restrap is another brand that has a whole range of top tube bags, with capacities stretching from 0.8 litres to this 2 litre bag, which ad 49cm long is designed to stretch from your head tube to your seatpost. It's made in Yorkshire from waterproof fabric, seam sealed and has a two-way water resistant zip, which opens from either end to make finding stuff easier.
Rubberised Velcro straps, including one around the seatpost, hold the bag in place on your frame and a rigid plastic structure ensures stability. There's a mesh side pocket allowing easy access to gels or stowage of waste wrappers.
Zefal Z Adventure T1 Top Tube Bag
£26 | View offer
Zefal's top tube bag has welded seams and a waterproof zip, so it's pretty weather resistant, while still being inexpensive. The 1 litre volume allows you to carry plenty of stuff. There's a strap-mounted and a bolt-mounted variant of the T1 available, as well as the longer T3, which has 2 litres capacity.
There's a mesh pocket and a key hook inside to help with organisation, while a cable channel lets you run a wire to a phone or from a dynamo hub. At 5cm wide, the T1 fits neatly behind your head tube too.
