How Many Americans Know How to Ride a Bike?

A Five Thirty Eight article reveals the data on the ubiquity, and relative lack thereof in certain populations, of the ability to ride a bike.

1 minute read

April 21, 2015, 1:00 PM PDT

By James Brasuell @CasualBrasuell


According to post by Mona Cahlibi, and based on the responses of 1,196 U.S. adults for a YouGov survey, "6 percent of Americans don’t know how to ride a bike."

The results of the survey (broken down in an Excel spreadsheet available for download) are also broken down regionally. So, in the Northeast, 12 percent of Americans don't know how to ride a bike, 3 percent in the Midwest, 5 percent in the South, and 6 percent in the West.

The survey results are also broken down by demographics:

"White Americans are the most likely to know how to ride a bike. Only 4 percent said they don’t know how, compared to 7 percent of Hispanic Americans and 10 percent of black Americans. Married Americans were half as likely as single Americans to not know how to ride a bike (4 percent compared to 8 percent)…"

The post also notes surprises in the amount of young Americans who know how to ride a bike, which reveals a cognitive bias that makes bike riders think that everyone knows how to ride a bike.

Thursday, April 16, 2015 in Five Thirty Eight

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