Tubeless tyre technology has been around for some time for mountain bikes, and most gravel bikes will be ready to be set up tubeless too, but it’s a comparatively new option for road cyclists.
However, there are an increasing array of options and most of the major tyre brands will now have tubeless road rubber in their ranges. It’s the same with wheels, with few new wheelsets not available tubeless-ready, and the makers of many old faithful models upgrading to offer tubeless compatibility.
So why should you set up your road bike tubeless and which tyres do we rate? Here’s a run down of the very best tubeless road tyres as tested by the BikeRadar test team.
What is a tubeless tyre?
Since time immemorial, road bike riders have used tyres with separate inner tubes. And, since then, you’ve seen them standing by the roadside, bike wheel off, trying to patch up a pin-prick hole in that floppy black rubber ring.
Tubeless tyre technology does away with all (or at least most) of that. Instead of the air in your bike’s tyre being held in the inner tube, a tubeless tyre makes an airtight seal with the wheel rim.
To do that, the tyre and the rim are made with closer tolerances than a tubed tyre and wheel, and the rim has a tubeless valve screwed into it to make an airtight connection.
The rim also has to be sealed to keep air in. Some are airtight by design, with no spoke holes in the rim bed, others achieve this using an adhesive rim tape applied to the rim bed.
To make sure air doesn’t leak, liquid sealant is poured inside the tyre when fitting (or injected through the valve).
Tubeless sealant is designed to seal small gaps between the tyre and rim, and deals with the majority of smaller punctures, healing them as they happen.
Tubeless tyre technology is the norm in other tyres, such as those found on cars and most motorcycles. It’s been slow to come to road bikes mainly due to the higher pressures used and the need to sort standards and tolerances.
Best tubeless road tyres 2022, rated and reviewed
Our collection of tubeless road tyre reviews is ever-growing, so it’s worth checking back for further tests. Here’s our crop of current top tubeless tyre reviews:
- Continental Grand Prix 5000S TR
- Goodyear Eagle F1
- WTB Exposure
- Schwalbe Pro One TLE
- Bontrager R3
- Continental Grand Prix 5000 TL
- Hutchinson Sector 28
- Pirelli P Zero Race TLR
- Specialized S-Works Turbo 2Bliss
- Cadex Race
- Hutchinson Fusion 5 Performance 11Storm TLR
- Maxxis Highroad HYPR K2
- Vittoria Corsa TLR G2.0
Continental Grand Prix 5000S TR
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- £69.95 as tested
- A perfect balance between performance and usability
- Compatible with hookless rims
The Continental GP 5000S TR replaced the GP 5000 TL as the brand’s top-end tubeless race tyre in late 2021.
In testing, we have found the tyre to be every bit as fast as the outgoing tyre (though we didn’t find Continental’s “20 per cent faster” claim to hold up to scrutiny) while now also being hookless compatible.
The tyre is also claimed to be more puncture-proof than the outgoing model.
If you want a great all-round tyre for fast riding, you’re very unlikely to be disappointed with these.
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Goodyear Eagle F1 Tubeless
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- £50 / $75 / AU$97/ €60 as tested
- Easy to set up
- Fast in a straight line and in the corners
- Excellent all-round performer
The Eagle F1’s wet and dry grip and speed impressed, courtesy of its advanced graphene- and silica-infused compound. There’s a Goodyear-specific R:Amor protection belt and a 120 TPI casing, and the weight is competitive at 310g for the 700 x 28mm size.
It’s great over rough road surfaces too, thanks to its suppleness and the high air volume of the 28mm carcass. Tubeless set up was easy, seating without the need for tyre levers or tubeless inflators.
It’s available in a wide range of sizes from 700 x 25mm up to 700 x 32mm, so you can optimise your grip and comfort levels as needed.
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WTB Exposure
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- £49.99 as tested
- Easy to set up
- Handy 30mm and 36mm widths (but nothing narrower)
- Black and tan sidewall options
Over our 2,300km of testing, we came to love the 30mm WTB Exposure tyres for their supple ride quality and durability. They were easy to set up, too.
The Exposure is one of few tubeless tyre options that sits in the space between 28mm and 32mm-plus widths, offering a touch more comfort and control while still fitting comfortably in many newer frames.
Weight is 305g and there’s enough grip for some light off-road action. There’s a 36mm option available if your bike can handle the width, and you can choose from black or tan sidewalls.
If you want a wide and versatile tubeless road tyre, this is a great option, but if you’re after a narrower option you’ll need to look elsewhere.
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Schwalbe Pro One TLE
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- £68.49 as tested
- Fast and versatile road tyre
- On the pricier side
- 25mm, 28mm and 30mm widths
The original Pro One was one of the first tubeless road tyres to be launched and this version – released in 2019 – is claimed to be faster, grippier and lighter than its predecessor.
Available for 700c wheels in 25mm, 28mm and 30mm widths, our test 28mm Pro Ones came in under Schwalbe’s published 270g weight.
After 1,300km of testing, including a fair amount of light gravel, they’ve proved robust and puncture-free. They feel fast and can handle low pressures, although they’re a bit more pricey than some alternatives.
There’s also a flagship tubeless 25mm Pro One TT variant, weighing in at around 205g, but that forgoes puncture protection.
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Bontrager R3 Hard-Case Lite TLR
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- £50 as tested
- Lightweight
- Great performance
- 32mm width only
Trek has been pushing the envelope on tyre widths, with its Domane endurance road bike clearing tyres up to 38mm.
This is reflected in its tyre range, with the R3 Hard-Case Lite TLR is only available in a 32mm width.
Despite their 32mm width, the Hard-Case Lite tyres are indeed light at under 320g, undercutting some top-rated 28s, but retain good sidewall support and stability.
They roll fast and grip well in the wet or dry, handling broken tarmac with aplomb.
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Continental Grand Prix 5000 TL
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- £70 as tested
- Excellent ride quality
- Good grip
- On the expensive side
Though it has been officially replaced by the aforementioned GP5000S TR, the original GP5000 TL is still widely available and is well worth considering if you can pick a pair up on the cheap.
Though you lose out on hookless compatibility and a claimed increase in puncture protection, the GP5000 TL is roughly as fast as the new tyre, so is unlikely to hold you back on fast rides.
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Hutchinson Sector 28
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- £45 as tested
- Road tyre that’s tough enough to mix it up on gravel and cobbles
- Now available in 28mm and 32mm widths
The Sector was one of the first road tubeless tyres that really impressed us, and it remains a valid choice for its combination of decent on-road performance and off-road durability.
Created as a plush alternative to tubulars, the Sector is a great choice if you ride on potholed lanes or like to include gravel diversions on your road rides.
Despite its durability, the Sector isn’t ridiculously heavy. Claimed weight for the 28mm is 295g and our test set actually came in around 15g under that figure.
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Pirelli P Zero Race TLR
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- £60 / $70 / AU$106/ €70 as tested
- Fast, grippy ride
- Easy tubeless set up
- Compatible with hookless rims up to 73psi
The P Zero Race TLR tyres are easy to fit and offer wide compatibility with wheels from different manufacturers. They follow the latest ETRTO standards for tubeless, meaning they are compatible with hookless rims – though Pirelli states a maximum inflation pressure of 73psi on such rims.
The tyre’s 120 TPI casing is claimed to add extra puncture protection and durability. Pirelli’s SmartEvo compound was, introduced with this tyre and is claimed to up traction and reduce rolling resistance relative to the brand’s previous generation tyres.
Our tester found good air retention that was up there with tubed tyres and that the rolling resistance was on a par with the best out there. Cornering was grippy and puncture protection good, and at 299g for a 700 x 28mm tyre, they impressed on the scales as well.
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Specialized S-Works Turbo 2Bliss Ready
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- £35 as tested
- Good value for money
- 28mm width fits a wide range of bikes
- Impressive all-round performance
The S-Works Turbo 2Bliss Ready comes in a 28mm width and weighs 285g. As with the other tyres listed here, we were impressed with the tyre’s supple feel and grip, while Spesh says that the Gripton compound is best in class for its low rolling resistance.
At £35 a tyre, the S-Works Turbo 2Bliss Ready is inexpensive for a tubeless tyre and compares well with tubeless tyres at twice the price.
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Cadex Race
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- £65 / $100 / AU$125 / €80 as tested
- Fast-rolling tyre for all-around performance
- Relatively high thread count gives a supple ride quality
- Compatible with hookless rims
Coming from Giant’s performance component brand Cadex, the Race tyre is its top performance road tyre. There’s a single layer 170 TPI casing to improve suppleness and reduce rolling resistance, and proprietary puncture protection and a rubber compound.
Tubeless setup was hassle-free, needing just a floor pump and a single tyre lever to ease the bead over the rim. They’re fully compatible with hookless rims too, and the tight seal led to minimal air loss over a week.
The Cadex Race copes well with rougher road surfaces and there’s good support at lower pressures, as well as predictable handling. A shallow herringbone tread pattern adds some extra grip on gritty roads. The only downside is that at 331g for a 700 x 28mm tyre they’re not the lightest.
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Hutchinson Fusion 5 Performance 11Storm TLR
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- £41 / $49 / AUI$72 / €49 as tested
- 292g weight and 127 TPI
- Affordable and grippy but need pressures over 74psi
Hutchinson was one of the pioneers of road tubeless and that experience shows in its latest tyre’s easy installation. We got our test set mounted without needing any tyre levers and the beads seated with just a track pump, but air retention was still good.
The Fusion 5 Performance uses the brand’s 11Storm silica-rich rubber compound, which, according to Hutchinson, has been independently proven to be softer and gripper than its predecessor. There’s a 127 TPI casing for good comfort over bumpy roads, though it’s not the supplest or fastest tubeless tyre we’ve tested.
Our testing showed the tyre pressure needs to be monitored more closely though, because they don’t like pressures below Hutchinson’s 74psi recommended minimum for the 700 x 28mm size.
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Maxxis High Road HYPR K2
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- £55 as tested
- Good grip
- Fast-feeling race tyre
- 25mm and 28mm widths
Maxxis says the Highroad HYPR K2 is its best road race tyre, with its HYPR rubber compound lowering rolling resistance and improving wet grip.
We weighed the 25mm tyre at 290g, although that’s 80g more than the non-tubeless option. Fitting was easy with a track pump and the tyre sealed easily to the rim. It’s also available as a 28mm tyre.
We found great straight-line speed and fast acceleration paired with progressive grip when cornering.
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Vittoria Corsa TLR G2.0
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- £70 / $80 as tested
- The performance we’ve come to expect from Vittoria
- 170 TPI thread count
- Easy tubeless set up
With a graphene-infused compound, Vittoria’s Corsa tyres feel as fast as they come. You get a genuine sensation of low rolling resistance no matter how bad the surface, and there’s great grip in the dry.
Tubeless set up is particularly easy and the tyres cope with a wide range of pressures.
On the downside, we found wear rates to be relatively high, with the tread cutting more easily than on others. Given this, they’re probably a better option for fast summer rides than long winter mile-munching, especially given the cost of replacements.
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Should I convert my road bike to tubeless?
Ride quality
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Supple: it’s a word that’s repeated time and again in reviews. Without a separate inner tube, the overall thickness of the casing is reduced, leading to a tyre that deforms more easily in response to road imperfections, leading to a more comfortable ride.
Lower tyre pressure
You can run tubeless tyres at lower pressures, typically dropping 5 to 10psi from what you’d run with a tubed setup. That’s because there’s no risk of pinch flats if you run over a rock or other bump in the road. The ability to run lower pressures further improves comfort, too.
Puncture protection
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As well as avoiding pinch flats, the sealant in a tubeless tyre protects against smaller punctures, often sealing the hole with minimal loss of pressure in the tyre. So hunting for those pin-prick holes in your tyre is a thing of the past.
But even the best tubeless sealants don’t always sort out larger holes or sidewall damage, so it’s still advisable to carry a spare tube and a pump, or a tubeless repair kit, just in case.
If your tyre does get a cut that the sealant can’t fix, we’ve got a guide on how to repair a tubeless tyre.
Lower friction and higher speed
The movement of an inner tube against the tyre’s casing causes significant friction, making tubed tyres slower as well as less comfortable. Butyl inner tubes have the most friction against the tyre; although you can reduce it by fitting latex inner tubes instead, it’s still a factor.
With no inner tube at all, and assuming all else is equal, tubeless is usually faster as well as more comfortable to ride.
Reduced rotating mass
Because you’ve done away with the inner tube, you can save a fair chunk of weight with a tubeless setup in some cases. That’s particularly true with the usual butyl tubes; the weight-saving with latex tubes is less, although latex tubes make up for that by being more fragile and leakier.
That saving is countered by the need to add 40ml to 60ml of sealant to your tyre to get a seal and benefit from puncture protection. Also, tubeless-ready tyres are typically heavier than their tubed brethren because they need to be airtight and usually have a heavier-duty bead for safety reasons.
Increased versatility
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As modern road bikes offer ever-increasing tyre clearances, many tubeless tyres are available in widths above the standard 25mm. With larger air volumes, you can take in even rougher terrain, heading onto gravel trails to up your repertoire of available rides.
Are there any drawbacks?
There are a few things to watch out for if you’re thinking about going tubeless.
Tricky set up
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We talked above about the tight design tolerances needed for tubeless to work at road bike tyre pressures. Many tubeless tyres can be set up on a wheel just using a track pump, but as tubeless standards for the road are still in flux, some combinations of wheel and tyre just won’t seat while others are excessively tight. You may need to use a tubeless-specific pump with an oversized air chamber, or a separate booster to seat a tyre.
The former is a pump where you pressurise a reservoir, then release the air into the tyre. That pushes more air into the tyre at higher pressure and faster, seating the tyre on the rim.
For more, read our detailed guide on how to set up road tubeless tyres.
Slow leaks
Once set up, you can often still get slow leaks from a tubeless tyre, due to incomplete sealing to the rim. Spinning the wheel can help distribute the sealant and stop the leak, but, if that doesn’t work, a quick ride up and down the road will often do the trick.
You may need to top up the sealant too, if you’ve lost a significant amount.
Sealant top ups
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The sealant in a tubeless tyre tends to dry out and set over time, so you need to keep an eye on whether there’s any liquid sealant still in there. If there isn’t, your tyre may not stay inflated if you get a puncture.
You need to monitor its level every month or so and keep it topped up. That usually means popping a tyre bead off the rim so you can see how much liquid sealant is left, adding more sealant if necessary and reseating the tyre. Or you can remove the valve core and squirt sealant through it.
Both can be slightly messy but Milkit has a system that lets you suck the liquid sealant out of the tyre, measure its volume, top it up and re-add it to the tyre. It’s a bit pricey but makes maintenance easier.
Non-sealing flats
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Tubeless sealant will often fix flats without you even noticing – we’ve had quite large thorn-induced punctures that would have otherwise stopped us in our tracks that have sealed up without us realising, and with a negligible drop in tyre pressure.
But some holes are too large for the sealant. Sidewall damage is often the cause.
You’ll either get a persistent leak or the plug of sealant will blow out if you have anything above minimal air pressure in your tyre. You might want to carry tyre levers, a pump and a spare tube to swap in if that happens.
Some sealants work better than others: take a look at our test of six popular choices.
Tubeless tyre jargon buster
Thinking about switching to tubeless tyres but confused by some of the jargon? Here’s our guide to the key tyre terms you need to know.
- Bead: The part on the edge of the tyre that mates with the rim. This is specially made on tubeless tyres to help form an airtight seal and is usually a tighter fit than a non-tubeless tyre bead.
- Casing: The fabric part of the tyre that supports the rubber tread. In a tubeless tyre, this needs to be airtight to maintain the tyre’s pressure.
- Hookless bead: A spillover from mountain bike wheels, hookless beads remove the lip from the wheel rim. This allows the wheel to be lighter and stronger, while the tyre-rim interface can be more aerodynamically efficient. But some tyre makers advise against fitting their road tyres on hookless rims because there’s less contact with the tyre and a potentially increased risk of the tyre blowing off the rim. It’s best to check manufacturers’ websites for any compatibility issues.
- Removable core: Many tubeless valves have a removable central core. Take this out and you can get more air into the tyre more quickly to aid inflation. It can also be removed to top up sealant levels if you have a flat or the sealant has dried out.
- Reservoir pump: A pump that stores up compressed air, which you then discharge into the tyre. The higher volume of air pushed into a tubeless tyre at pressure can make sealing the tyre to the rim easier. You can also buy a separate reservoir that fits between a standard track pump and the tyre valve to achieve the same result.
- Sealant: Liquid poured into the tyre, typically latex-based, that helps it form an airtight bond to the rim and stop air leaks from minor punctures.
- Sidewall: The outward-facing edges of the tyre that aren’t in contact with the road surface.
- Track pump: A long hand-operated pump for tyres. Using a standard track pump is often enough to seat a tubeless tyre, although you may need a reservoir pump to get a seal without too much elbow grease.
- Tread: The rubber compound that forms the outer surface of the tyre on which you ride.
- Tubeless-ready wheel: You need a tubeless-ready wheelset to set up tubeless tyres on your bike. Most, but not all, newer wheelsets will be tubeless-ready. They’ll be built to tolerances that mean there’s a close fit to tubeless tyres, which should aid installation. But some may need to have tubeless rim tape fitted to set them up for tubeless running.
- Tubeless valve: Since there’s no inner tube, a tubeless setup has a separate Presta-type valve. This is screwed into the wheel rim before mounting the tyre and has a seal around its base to prevent air loss around the rim’s valve hole.
- UST: Designation and standard for tubeless tyres and rims used by Mavic. Most Mavic wheels are UST tubeless and the brand recommends its UST tyres for use on its rims. UST is a slightly different standard, although other tubeless tyres should fit okay.