I rode the original Lectric XP electric bike for six months during the pandemic in 2020. It was a salve, a way to feel the breeze on my face during quarantine and go farther than usual without hopping on public transportation. I have a bit of a soft spot for it. Lectric’s aim was to deliver a foldable, powerful fat-tire ebike for under $1,000, and this is still true with version 3.0 of the XP three years later.
I’ve seen more Lectric ebikes here in New York City than I can count. I get it—the Lectric XP is one of the most affordable foldable ebikes, and it comes with a lot of extras. I’d still never buy it myself—I live in a walk-up and don’t want to deal with such a heavy, bulky thing. That doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate this chunky vehicle. In the third iteration, Lectric has made some small but nice tweaks to the formula, resulting in a more refined and functional fat-tire ebike that’s still fun to ride.
XP Gain
I tested the standard Lectric XP, but as usual there’s a Step-Thru model if you want an easier time clambering onto the seat. Much of what I said in my review of the Lectric XP 1.0 is the same for the XP 3.0. This thing comes completely assembled, so all you need to do is take it out of the box and unfold it. It’s still freakin’ heavy (in fact, it’s 1 pound heavier at 64 pounds), but I found it easier to unfold than the cheaper and lighter Lectric XP Lite—the hinge is a lot smoother.
It’s still annoying to maneuver and carry. I wish there was a way to affix the tires to each other when the Lectric is folded up, à la the Montague ME-1, which has tires that can be hooked together so that the whole ebike can roll around like a trolley. The XP 3.0 is bulky, so carrying it is a pain even with the metal handle near the seat post. There’s almost always something jabbing my legs as I walk down my steps.
Make sure you choose the Elite Bundle when you buy, as it comes with a larger seat, suspension seat post, bike lock, and Elite headlight. These are all really handy accessories. As a 6’4″ man, I much prefer the giant seat over the original saddle; it’s more comfortable. This is my first time trying a suspension seat post, and consider me a convert. It makes those sudden bumps on the road easier on the butt. The headlight gets fairly bright, though its position tends to move around if the roads are rough, so you may have to readjust it every so often. I appreciate the option to install storage for the included bike lock, though it was a little tricky with the narrow space on the frame. At least I don’t need to bring a bag to carry the lock.
Three years on and I’m still not a fan of how you power the ebike. Lectric makes you stick a key into the bottom frame of the downtube. Twist it to turn the battery on so that you can press the power button on the handlebar and bring the XP 3.0 to life. If you plan to park it outdoors often, the key also unlocks the battery, allowing you to take it indoors for safety and recharging. I just hate constantly having to reach the underside of the frame. Do you think James Bond would be hunting for the keyhole before he hopped on a motorcycle? So uncool.
Binoculars mean the difference between seeing a little gray bird and identifying a titmouse, cheering a home run and seeing the epic catch, or realizing that the 10-point buck is actually a doe standing in front of dead branches.
Whether you’re scouting terrain, watching birds in your backyard, or getting season tickets at Fenway, binoculars bring the world closer, making it sharp and clear far beyond what your eye is capable of seeing. Finding the right pair of binoculars means first figuring out what you’re going to use them for. If you’d just like to watch some birds at the feeder in your backyard and perhaps overcome the limitations of the cheap seats at the ballpark, there’s no need to spend a fortune. On the other hand, if you plan to go birding in diverse locations, or are planning a big hunt in unfamiliar territory, it’s often worth the extra money to get something a little more powerful.
Be sure to check out our other guides, including The Best Gear to Make Your Backyard More Fun, The Best Hiking Gear, and How a Birdfeeder Can Bring You Joy.
Updated February 2023: We’ve noted Nikon’s new Prostaff models, added links to Leica’s Noctivid binoculars, and updated models, pricing, and availability throughout.
Table of Contents
Best Overall
Best High Powered
Best Compact
Best for Kids
Best for Special Use Cases
What Do the Model Numbers Mean?
Why the High Price Tags?
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What Do the Model Numbers Mean?
Binoculars are usually listed with two number specifications; for example, the Nikon Monarch M5 are 8×42.
The number 8 refers to the magnification power. Objects seen through these binoculars will be eight times bigger than when you look with your naked eye. Newcomers should stick with 6x or 8x. They have enough power that you’ll see things clearly, but they don’t magnify so much that you’ll struggle to find what you want to see or have trouble following fast-moving objects (though all binoculars take some practice).
The 42 refers to the size of the front lens in millimeters. The larger the lens size, the more light reaches your eye. That means the image will be bigger, brighter, and clearer. A pair of 8×42 binoculars are often significantly brighter and have a better viewing experience than a pair of 8×32 binoculars, even though both provide the same magnification. But the larger you get, the more glass they will use—so they’ll weigh more. The weight difference between a pair of 8×32 and 10×42 binoculars is significant if you’re wearing them all day. We suggest sticking with the 26-50 range. Our top pick is roughly in the middle, at 8×42, generally considered the sweet spot for most people.
Best Overall
Nikon’s Monarch 5 binoculars were my first “real” binoculars. Years later, their upgraded M5 is my top pick for most people just getting started. These offer great bang for your buck, and the 8×42 magnification is the most versatile. It isn’t just me, either. These are some of the most common binoculars I see when I’m out birding.
The Monarch M5s strike an excellent balance between optical power, quality, and price. The glass in these provides nice, bright views with very little chromatic aberration (the distortions or fringing that you sometimes see around objects in bright sunlight).
Bar none, there is no company that’s easier to make fun of than Texas-based Yeti. My house is full of hilariously overengineered, overpriced products. The problem starts when these products become the most useful items I own.
Just this morning, I used the Camino Carryall to drag my climbing gear to the gym. I had to take my daughter’s roller skating gear out of it, and before that 15 tiny soccer balls that I took to the park to play with kindergarteners. It’s five years old and looks as good as new. And the Yeti Lowlands? I carry that heavy-duty blanket to every festival and camping trip. I don’t have to stake the corners. It pads over every small rock and blade of prickly grass, and it has its own sling carrying case!
I even forced my husband to make a pilgrimage to the Yeti flagship store in Austin, Texas. On one level, I find it repulsive to make such an ostentatious production out of spending so much money on the company’s signature cooler. A cooler! It’s just something to put your Coke and bait in! Yet everything was so exquisite, so heavy, in just the right colors. As I wandered the aisles picking things up and putting them down again, I felt a deep, primal yearning for a Ford F150 and a fly-fishing vest.
Rinse and repeat when I first opened the box for the Yeti Yonder water bottle, which looked more like a sarcophagus hand-carved for the boy king Tutankhamen than a shipping container. The first thing I saw was the gigantic, full-color visage of climbing and skiing luminary Jimmy Chin, with his signature reckless grin, looming over two water bottles that were the color of sea glass before a storm. I picked one up and have simply never put it down. You guessed it. The 25-ounce Yonder is now my emotional support water bottle. I can and will have no other.
Field of Dreams
When I’m at home, I mostly drink from a Stanley tumbler. But when I’m out of the house, my previous favorite water bottle was a 26-ounce Yeti Rambler with a chug cap.
I have weirdly specific water bottle requirements. I used to have a Nalgene, but it wasn’t insulated, and hot Nalgene water tastes just like taking a long lick off the bottom of a sticky McDonald’s ball pit. I’m also a talky, distracted drinker who has a tendency to pour water straight down the front of my shirt at the gym. (“Put to mouth, then drink,” I repeat to myself, to no avail.) The chug cap is a good compromise between being able to swig water quickly and not drenching myself with a single careless movement.
The Rambler is also dishwasher-safe! While my children use straw-cap bottles for their ease and convenience, I loathe cleaning them. I need specialized brushes to scrub the mold out of all the tiny valves and tubes, and then air-dry them every night. I will undertake this task for my kids, but not for myself. The Rambler is also insulated, and I can fill the whole thing with ice and refill it several times during the day and the ice won’t melt.
Yes, the Rambler is a perfect water bottle, except for one factor—its weight. Even empty, it weighs about 1.4 pounds. That’s fine if you’re in a car, on a boat, or pulling it in a wagon, but carrying that much weight on your back for an extended period is grueling.
Back Saver
Photograph: Yeti
That’s where the Yonder comes in. When I flew to CES and had to face the prospect of carrying a backpack from 7 am to midnight almost every day, taking my Rambler was a grim prospect. No, there was only one refillable water bottle I considered; a lightweight bottle whose cap I could wash and dry easily in and next to a hotel sink.
This year, Garmin released two high-end adventure watches: the Epix ($1,000) and this year’s update to the Fenix series, the Fenix 7S Sapphire Solar (8/10, WIRED Recommends). The Epix has a 47-mm case and a large, brilliant AMOLED screen; the Fenix has a memory-in-pixel (MIP) display. However, the Epix’s case is huge, and the display eats up a lot of battery. I’d go with the Fenix instead.
This year’s iteration has vastly improved battery life with solar charging—I got two weeks off one charge, with intermittent sunlight during a cloudy Oregon winter. Multiple GPS systems meant that it pinpointed my location with incredible speed and accuracy, even in the rain and under tree cover. It can record every biometric for every sport under the sun. And honestly, maps on the MIP still look detailed and pretty great. The downside? It is still fairly spendy, and earlier iterations do go on sale pretty often.
★ Alternative: I am currently testing the Coros Apex 2 Pro ($500), and if having a super bright, super crisp display or a super easy-to-use app is not at the top of your list of priorities, this is a slightly more affordable alternative. It connects to all five satellite systems and includes the dual-frequency GNSS support that the Apple Watch Ultra has, for more precise (and fast!) location tracking. With regular use, the battery lasted over a month.
The tracking is as accurate as the Apple Watch Ultra’s, but Coros’ training plans and metrics in their proprietary training system, EvoLab, are as detailed and helpful as Garmin’s. The plans are also clearly aimed at more experienced runners, although there are a few for beginners. I also like the big grooved buttons, the fact that the screen locks, and the startlingly wide variety of watch faces.
Autumn is my favorite time in the South. There’s a day, usually in late October, when the humidity finally breaks, the air stirs, and you can feel it in your bones: Summer is over. If you’re in the Midwest, that might be a shame because snow is coming, while those of you in California might think, “What are seasons?” But for those of us down here near the Gulf of Mexico, cool, dry air is a thing of beauty.
The endless hum of the air conditioner cuts off and you can hear the insects again. The windows are thrown open and you can lie on the couch, book in hand, and remember why it is you live here in the first place. This, my friends, is a good life. The only problem is that the wonderful afternoon breeze can blow away when you’re busy making dinner. By midnight, your open window is an invitation to the thunderstorm soaking the couch and the bag full of camera gear and batteries you left on it. That is precisely what happened to me earlier this year.
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High Tide
Couches dry. So do bags. But the camera and batteries would have been ruined (including one, ahem, that wasn’t mine), except that I had decided a couple months earlier to keep my batteries and cameras in dry bags inside my actual carrying bag.
I spend a lot of time near water, so this isn’t as overkill as it might sound. But the real key to this decision was my discovery of Matador’s very sleek, slim, lightweight dry bags. A traditional rubber-type dry bag is bulky and difficult to get in and out of another bag. I have traditional bags, but I really only use them when I’m on the water paddling.
The genius of Matador’s new bags is in their lightweight construction. The 8-liter bag weighs a mere 2.3 ounces and is made from waterproof 70D ripstop nylon, which isn’t bulky. Even with such lightweight materials, they achieve an IPX7 rating (meaning they’re submersible at a depth of 1 meter for 30 minutes).
Something for Everyone
There are two sizes available, a 2-liter and an 8-liter. I use the 2-liter to store all my batteries, and the 8-liter to hold my Sony A7 along with two lenses and a pair of binoculars. This setup means I just grab two bags on my way out the door and I know I have everything I need, whether I’m putting them in a backpack, shoulder bag or camping bin. The Matador dry bags also have a flat bottom, which means you can set them down and they won’t automatically crumple over (whether they stay upright ultimately depends on what’s inside, but mine do).
The bags are not seam-sealed, which gave me pause at first, but Matador claims the welded construction it uses is more dependable and durable than seam-sealing. I’ve only had them for about three months so I can’t comment too much on long-term durability, but so far they’re fine and I’ve seen no evidence of any seam-peeling or delamination along the seams. They have a very sturdy feel to them, and they also come with a 1-year warranty. The bags are eligible for repairs even after that.
Perhaps the best feature is the little clear vertical window running down the side of the bag, which allows you to see the contents of the bag without opening it. With only two (of different sizes), I know what’s in them, but after the rain incident I ordered another one and it’ll be nice to see at a glance which has batteries and which has clothes—all of them, dry.
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