A 10 year old is pretty much the perfect age to buy a mountain bike for, since they are old enough to genuinely enjoy mountain biking as much as you do and to stand a chance of keeping up with you on the trails – assuming that they don’t pass you up.
Most 10 year old kids are best suited with a mountain bike that is either a 24” wheel size kids bike or a XS adult mountain bike. Exceptionally tall 10 year olds might even be able to fit a S size adult mountain bike frame.
There is this range here in part because of the fact that the height that most ten year old kids can be a is a range too and therefore the height that their mountain bike needs to be should reflect this range. There are a few other things besides height that should also be taken into consideration when you are picking a mountain bike besides height that I will touch on in a moment, but first let us take a look at just how tall an average 10 year old tends to be.
How Tall Is The Average 10 Year Old?
There are a number of different factors that can affect the size of a 10 year old. Three of the main things are genetics, puberty, and even gender. These three things combined can either make your 10 year old the shortest kid in their class or head and shoulders above the other kids their age.
However, knowing just what size 10 year old is likely to be can be an important thing to know if you are buying a mountain bike for a 10 year old niece or nephew, or someone else that you may not have the availability to measure before buying them a bike.
The first thing that can affect the height of a kid this age is their genetics. If they have parents that are only 5’ tall, then odds are that at 10 years old they will not be quite this tall yet. However, if on the other hand both parents are closer to 6’ tall, then they might very well already be 5’ when they are 10 years old.
Puberty is another factor that affects height, and this also depends on a kid’s gender since puberty hits boys before it affects girls. Usually puberty will trigger a growth spurt somewhere around two years into it, which can be anywhere between 11 to 14 years old for boys and anywhere between 8 to 12 years old for girls.
This being the case, it is entirely possible for a 10 year old girl to have already started her growth spurt which will of course affect her height. However, this also means that a 10 year old boy will not have hit this growth spurt yet, meaning that a 10 year old girl may very well be taller than a 10 year old boy.
Finally, another thing that can affect the height of a kid this age is any long or chronic illnesses. Even though a girl should have already started her growth spurt by this age or be close to doing so, if her body has been fighting off an illness or is busy recovering from an injury then her body will postpone going into puberty in order to build itself back up first.
A healthy kid whose body is getting enough rest, exercise, and vitamins is much more likely to start puberty at an early age since it knows that it has everything that it needs in order to build more bone and muscles as required by having a growth spurt.
All of that being said, the average height for a 10 year old boy is around 54.5 inches, with 4 inches more or less than this being the average range. Girls who have not hit puberty yet should also have this exact range of heights, with girls who have hit their growth spurt averaging 4 inches more.
How Height Affects Mountain Bike Size
As mentioned, a 10 year old will be most likely be either comfortable with a 24” kids size mountain bike or an XS adult mountain bike size. A 24” kids size mountain bike is actually the largest size that kids bikes come in, with an XS being the smallest size that adult mountain bikes come in.
This being the case, if you feel that the teen that you have in mind is somewhere in between these two sizes or is likely to quickly grow into the next size up, then one option that you can choose to go with is to take a XS mountain bike and then to put the 24” wheel size on it so that it will be bigger than the kids bike and yet smaller than the adult mountain bike.
If you choose to go with this route, then as the 10 year old gets older and grows taller you could then simply switch back to the 26” tires that this size of a mountain bike most often comes with. Depending on the frame of the mountain bike, then you could possible even upgrade to 27.5” tires as the young teen continues to grow.
Going with that route is a great way to help one mountain bike to last as long as possible before it gets outgrown and yet to make sure that it fits well without being something that will need to be grown into which is never a good idea anyway.
If the 10 year old that you have in mind is smaller than average for whatever reason, then a 20” kids bike is likely the best fit, while any kid this age who is taller than average should be able to go with a S size mountain bike frame.
Other Things To Consider When Getting A Mountain Bike For a 10 Year Old
Whatever the height chart says about what size mountain bike is good for your 10 year old, if they feel uncomfortable on a bike that is that size then they may be better suited to a bike that is a different size. You have to keep in mind that some people’s skeletal frames are built differently, with some people having longer legs compared to the rest of their body while other people have comparatively short legs.
Other things that you should consider is the different parts of the bike that can be adjusted. There are mainly three areas of a bike that can be adjusted. One is the pedals, which can be only adjusted a little but which require buying a new crankset.
The other two main things that are much easier to adjust is the height of the handlebar and the height of the seat. These come with some ability to adjust higher or lower when you first get them, however if this is not enough you can buy longer post bars for these so that they can go even higher if a bike seems to be a little smaller than what a 10 year old needs, which makes this another great way to help a mountain bike last longer before it gets grown out of.
Another one of the things to consider is what you should get with the mountain bike. Mountain bike safety is something that is very important, even more so for young and quite possibly inexperienced mountain bikers. This being the case, you should also get other things like a helmet if nothing else.
A set of a helmet, knee pads, elbow pads, and gloves would be a great set that would cover pretty much all that a 10 year old is likely to need. However, if that 10 year old is very prone to accidents or likes trying risky things on a regular basis, you might want to get them a little more protection than that.