Tool kit
Complete tool kits sold in a case usually contain six things you will use and twenty you will not. This is the order we actually acquired ours, and what each stage unlocks.
Under £40 — covers roughly 70% of roadside and garage jobs
The single most used tool on any bike. Buy the ball-end version; it reaches awkward bolts.
Metal levers gouge rims and pinch tubes. Plastic ones cost less and do less damage.
A track pump with a gauge saves more punctures than any tyre upgrade.
Wet lube for winter, dry for summer. The rag matters as much as the lube.
Another £50 — the point where servicing stops meaning a shop visit
Costs less than a takeaway and prevents you destroying a cassette by riding a stretched chain.
Needed the moment you replace a chain yourself.
Ordinary pliers fray inner cables. This is not a tool you can improvise.
Optional on steel and aluminium. Not optional anywhere near carbon.
Only if you enjoy this
Transforms every job. Also the thing most likely to sit unused in a small flat.
Cheap, but easy to make a wheel worse. Practise on an old wheel first.
Standard-specific and quickly obsolete. Borrow before buying.
One deliberate omission: we do not list brands. Tool quality varies within every brand, availability differs by country, and a recommendation written this year tends to be wrong by the next. Buy the cheapest version of a tool you rarely use, and the best version of the hex keys you touch every week.