Kids Ride Shotgun Pro EVO Bike Seat Review

The Kids Ride Shotgun Pro EVO seat is a great way to get your kids (and your whole family!) out riding at younger ages more easily. The bucket seat, five-point harness, and chest height “handle bars” let you get kids as young as nine months out riding with you.

Then, once your child is a little older, you can ditch the bucket seat and harness, and the seat converts to the Kids Ride Shotgun Pro, which can be used up to five years old. While expensive, this versatile seat does it all, and your family can enjoy it for years to come.

We were very excited to review this version of the Kids Ride Shotgun seat because we’re big fans of the front-style bike seats. Our older kids started fairly early on a front seat, similar to the PRO version of the seat, and we credit that to their riding skills developing early on, and also to their love of biking.

Overall, we really liked this seat and it’s a great way to get your family out riding with the youngest kiddos, however, there are a few things we didn’t love, and because of those, we would still transition our kiddos to the PRO version as soon as possible.

Read on to learn more, and also make sure to review our list of the best kids bike seats. Yes, the KRS is on it!

REVIEW IN A NUTSHELL

PROS: 

• Can be used for a quite young, small child
• Is an all in one design that can convert for larger children
• Comes with an extra stem collar so you can have multiple bikes set up for the seat
• Durable design
• Comfortable for the kiddo
• Fits almost any style mountain and e-bike
• No frame contact

CONS:

• High price tag
• Bucket seat design feels very large on small-medium frame bikes
• Similarly, the EVO configuration puts the rider up fairly high, making the combination of a shorter parent and taller kiddo uncomfortable
• Is a little cumbersome for riding that requires tighter turns

Price: $439

SET UP AND MOUNTING

One of the coolest features of the Kids Ride Shotgun Pro EVO seat (and all of their PRO seats) is the fact that there is no frame contact. Not only does it make it safer and less stressful to attach it to an expensive bike (especially carbon fiber), but it also makes for a super quick mount and dismount, or to swap from one bike to another.

The seat is mounted on a bar that attaches one end to your stem and then the other to your seatpost. As long as your bike has a standard 1 ⅛” steerer tube, at least 10mm of headset space, and front suspension, the seat will fit your stem. On the other end, you need at least 14mm of seat post space. It will work with a dropper as long as you have an adequate amount of exposed post.

The seat will NOT work on road, gravel, or commuter bikes. It is designed specifically for mountain bikes.

The initial setup is a bit tedious. You’ll have to take the handlebars off your bike(s) and replace a collar on your stem with their specific collar. The seat has two collars included (so you can use the seat on two separate bikes). A few types of headsets require a separate adapter, which you can purchase on their site, along with additional collars if desired.

After the collar is placed, the seat is a breeze to mount and dismount, literally taking only seconds. This is a huge plus, because with the bucket seat configuration, it’s not convenient or desirable to ride with the seat attached without a kiddo aboard. It also makes it easy to switch riders back and forth between mom and dad in the middle of the ride (as long as you have a collar installed on both bikes beforehand).

TIGHT FIT

One downfall of the bucket seat, because of the additional space needed for the seat back/handlebars, is that it’s not ideal for smaller bike frames. My husband rides a large frame, and even then it took some very detailed adjusting to keep our daughter’s knees from hitting the handlebars, while also trying to avoid my husband’s knees hitting the seat.

Similarly, the no frame contact mount combined with the bucket seat puts the kiddo up fairly high, so a combination of a shorter rider and taller child isn’t ideal.  If you’re riding roads or straighter trails with a smaller rider (our tester was on the larger end of the age/size range), you could make the small-medium frames work, but for riding anything with tighter turns, it’s not a comfortable ride.

CONSTRUCTION

The seat itself is made mostly of lightweight foam, with a hard outer plastic shell. It’s super easy to wipe down.

We ride on an iron range with lots of red dirt but the Pro EVO wiped off without any staining. None of the foam is removable, but there wouldn’t be any need for it to be removed. The straps have also been easy to clean so far. 

SUPPORT

Overall the seat seems very comfortable. Our tester had no complaints about being strapped in and seemed very content and comfortable in the seat.

Kids Ride Shotgun made the seat super easy to adjust/recline with a locking latch, making it easy to adjust on the go to fit different riding styles and adapt for the child’s comfort. The seat itself is tall and gives support to the child’s upper back. 

There are no armrests, but it does have a “handlebar” that sits in front of the child for them to rest their hands on. The footpegs have a back to keep the small rider’s feet from falling off, are fully adjustable and have straps that are also adjustable. 

The seat reclines easily with a locking latch, and also slides back and forth on the mounting bar, making it very smooth and simple to adjust on the go.

The child is well supported in the seat, and could even fall asleep without too much inconvenience. Obviously, you’ll have to watch your riding, but you’ll still be able to ride with a sleeper, unlike the traditional Shotgun seat. 

SAFETY

The Kids Ride Shotgun seats meets EN 14344 and ASTM F3641 safety standards for front-mounted seats, and also undergoes independent quality inspections from TUV (a functional safety program).

The harnessed seat includes a 5-point harness, sternum strap and a Fidlock buckle, which is childproof but easy for parents to get kids in and out of. Everything was easily adjustable and seemed very comfortable for our daughter. It’s designed to be easy to buckle from behind, ie. while you’re already sitting on your bike, so seating and unseating your child isn’t a production.

RANGE OF USE

The harnessed configuration of the Pro EVO is designed for riders age 9-24 months (or 9-33lbs), and then it converts to the Pro seat for ages 2-5 (or 26lbs – 60lbs). It is recommended that your child can independently hold up their head well before trying this seat, and for children under 12 months, check in with their pediatrician first.

We’ve reviewed the Pro seat before, so won’t get into all the features here (go read our KRS Pro review for more on that), but know that we’re BIG fans of the seat once your child is ready to ride without a harness.

RIDER/PARENT EXPERIENCE

This seat is definitely more suited to city or dirt road riding, something where you aren’t doing a lot of maneuvering. As mentioned earlier it’s a bit cumbersome for the adult rider, especially on small-medium sized frames. Lots of tight turns will result in either the adult or child rider bumping knees. It’s meant for mountain bikes, but it can be a little tricky with a taller child and shorter adult, given the fact that you’re forward-leaning on a mountain bike. My husband is 6 foot and rides a large frame, and had a better fit than I.  

It does affect your balance a bit more than the Pro version, but not to the extent that it feels unsafe. It’ll be a little different for each adult, but we did find that your knees will notice the bucket seat, and it’s not the most comfortable ride for the adult.

It’s important to note that ALL front-mounted harness seats (like the Thule Yepp Mini) have this issue to some degree. We’ve yet to test one of these seats where you don’t have to ride at least someone bow-legged. The higher back on the KRS and the fact that it’s mounted higher, however, make it more challenging to maneuver on singletrack than a seat like the iBert.

For this reason, we would transition to the Pro version as quickly as possible, and would mostly likely only use it on mostly straight trails and roads.

On the more positive side, we appreciated the fact that this gets younger children (and hence our family!) out riding together much sooner. That’s worth a lot!

It is quick to load and unload the child, and the five point harness is easy to fasten and adjust from behind so you as the parent can already be on your bike.

While the seat is expensive, it has a long lifespan and there’s the ease of having one seat that “does it all.” Additionally, if you had kids at different ages, it would be extremely handy to have one seat that works for riding with either of them without having to readjust your bike for a different seat.

ANOTHER FAVORITE FEATURE

A fun addition to this seat (and all the Kids Ride Shotgun products) are the tattoos and stickers. My kids LOVED the various animals riding bikes, with and without their parents.

And my two year old was very impressed that all the animals were wearing their helmets. A word of warning though, they’re very long lasting tattoos and if your kiddos talk you into joining them, you may show up to work with a “shred til bed” tattoo you had forgotten. 

BOTTOM LINE

The all-in-one style seat is a great way to get your family riding for years, and it’s great that you don’t have to purchase multiple different seats, and be constantly adapting your bike to fit a new one. Once you’ve set it up for the harnessed version you won’t have to adjust your own bike until you decide to retire the Kids Ride Shotgun seat altogether.

However, the harnessed version was more unwieldy and awkward than we were hoping for. Bottom line is we’ll definitely be using this for early exposure to casual biking, and then transitioning our kids as soon as they’re ready for the Pro version. (Which Kids Ride Shotgun suggests is when your child can sit unaided, follow basic instructions, and stay awake for the length of your bike ride).

About The Reviewer