Detour Bike Light

The Outbound Detour is a US designed and assembled bike light by a small team of people looking to bring great bicycle lighting to the masses. It is a good start, but not quite there. I’ll go into the good, the bad/ok, and the ugly.

The Good

This light is packaged well. Fit and finish is excellent and this light seems like it would hold up over the long term. The mounting method is strong and robust… maybe a bit too robust as it is hard to get the light out of the mount. It’s also reasonably compact being wider than it is long, so it looks great on the bike (if you don’t use an out front bike mount).

The Bad/ok

There could be another level between high and medium. Under 2 hours for high, and over 4 hours on medium, leaves the common range of under 3 hours uncovered, which is the time for a good night road ride of about 40 miles. Also, my light had a damaged power button, but Outbound very quickly sent me a new light.

The Ugly

Even though this light does have a cutoff, it’s rather poorly defined. It’s hard to know where that cutoff is and therefore hard to aim to keep the light out of people’s eyes while retaining down-road vision.

And about that down-road vision… It’s not actually that great compared to other StVZO lights on the market. The light field is not homogeneous, leaving a bright blob in the very center with reduces your ability to see slightly off center. There is also minimal spread of light down the road. In the attached image, you'll see that the curb is not illuminated except in the very center. The light field needs improvement to be competitive amongst the best road bike lights.

I was hopeful that this light would be an upgrade over my old StVZO compliant light seeing how it advertises over 1000 lumens, but the lack of an even lighting field with a fuzzy cutoff makes it uncomfortable to ride with. I ended up utilizing Outbound’s generous return policy.

I have the Detour Road bike light. I generally like the light as it is pretty bright and convenient and has held up well after quite a bit of use. The handlebar mount itself uses a screw, so it is not super convenient to put the mount on and off the handlebar, but it is very secure and removing/inserting the light from/to the mount works very well.

The USB charging is great, but it is annoying that most of my existing USB cables will not work with it. Outbound does sell their cable at a great price and it is solid, so I ended up buying a few extras to keep in various charging locations, it just would have been nicer to be able to use whatever USB-C cable I happened to have at hand.

This is the brightest light Ive had, makes me feel much safer commuting. The light angle makes it so I don't blind cars or pedestrians on bike paths either! The mount is thoughtfully designed- it is out of the way when I load my bike up with a handlebar bag for bikepacking and I love that I can easily take the light off and put it in my pocket when locking my bike up in the city

My Detour light battery was finally spent after over two years of daily use. As advertised, I was offered the service of battery replacement for free. I sent the light from the U.K. and it got lost in the post, so I was sent a new light as replacement for free.
This company does not only make some of the best lights in the market, but back it up with sterling service. Thank you.

I pair the detour with a hangover, and actually use them most running my pointing dog with an e scooter. Both produce copious light, although you’ll have to charge fairly often. I have had an issue with the helmet-mounted light’s male prongs breaking, but OL sent me a free replacement immediately. Also, my detour inexplicably quit working after about a year, and again, OL immediately sent a replacement. Great customer service and great illumination.

I bought this light with high hopes thinking it would be a game-changer for my night gravel rides, but it's actually a bit of a downgrade from my super cheap lights. When riding straight it lights up the way really well, better than most lights I've used. But as soon as a sharp turn comes there's a terrible dark spot right where light is needed. To the point that it's caused me to crash because I couldn't tell how sharp a turn was. For a dedicated gravel light this one doesn't cut it for me.

UPDATE: Outbound replaced my Detour with a Portal and that completely solved my problems. I didn't want a light on my helmet and the Portal is perfect on the bars. I'd highly recommend the Portal over the Detour for technical gravel - just remember to block the beam with your hand for oncoming cars.