Bike Commuting

I bought some lights from AliExpress (the brand is Rockbros), they work very well. Strong light, decent battery life, rechargeable by USB-C. Good times all around

I'm not sure how their BS01 bike light is, but I have a lot of other sofirn lights and they're rock solid considering the price point. Unfortunately I don't think they have a matching red one for the rear though.

Love this tail light: https://www.niterider.com/products/vmax-%E2%84%A2-150-bike-taillight I have a bit of webbing on a milk crate it clips onto easily, or I can hook it to my collar or waistband.

And I use a high performance cylinder light on a headlamp under my helmet for front lighting. I like that wherever I look is always lit up that way.

I mainly use this rear light. It comes with a bracket so you can mount it to the back of your rear rack. Then you just clip it in. I hate the rubber band lights.

I'm also quite happy with this front light. The mount stays on your bars and the light really easily clips in and out.

Borth are usb-c. Don't bother with the planet bike front lights. Maybe their nicer ones are better but the mount is ass for the cheaper ones.

TL;DR: Trek Commuter Pro RT with Flare RT rear (available as a set).

Some background: I'm all about dyno lights; my favorite combo is Schmidt SON dyno with a Supernova front and rear light. The dynamo light system is a buy once-cry once affair. It's always ready to go, year-round, and it never requires any further thought once installed. I get really into dialing the wiring and making it look like it came that way from the factory.

My partner gifted me the Trek Pro RT set because I wasn't going to invest in a whole dyno system on one of my new bikes. The front light is a shaped beam (absolutely critical) with a low and high beam function. The taillight has daylight and nighttime modes. I think the taillight can even automatically switch between daytime and nighttime (don't quote me on that). But the really sexy bit is that the headlight wirelessly turns the taillight on and off, as well as shows a gauge of the battery levels of both lights.

This set is now my go-to on all my bikes except the ones that already have dynos. I have some high speed downhill portions of my commute (>40 MPH), and it's nighttime both ways for most of the year. I never outrun the beam on this headlight.

There are all kinds of mounts available to allow these to fit whatever your bike setup might be. The side visibility is great, and the beam patterns are on par with some of the best German dyno lights.

My current setup is a universal mount with a Fenix E35, just your typical (expensive high-performance) cylindrical flashlight. I keep it dim, but it gets ridiculously bright if I do need something to see by.

For the rear I use a Fenix LD15R. It's a little clip-on light that I put on my backback. It's perfect because it's wearable and can shine red, not just white.

Before this, I was really happy with a set of lights from knog. Two wearable knog plus lights, to be specific. I used to clip them on my person instead of onto the bike, that way I never worried about mounting or forgetting them on the bike to be stolen. They do also come with a magnetic mount that you can rubber-band onto your bike, helmet, or whatever else the clip wouldn't work for.

Knogs "gimmick" on a lot of their lights is built-in usb A contacts. The lights can be charged by plugging them in like usb drives into any usb port or charger.

For "be seen" lights knog has great options, and while there are cheaper lights, my knog lights lasted. They kept working for years of daily use, and I didn't replace them because they didn't work. Only because I didn't want to keep charging them every two days with how much cycling I was doing.

Since they're capable of high brightness, the Fenix lights last weeks at dim "be seen" brightness.

Edit: OH! And if you didn't think of it yet, the most cost-effective visibility upgrade might be retro-reflectors. I got a roll of reflective vinyl tape for 10 euros at a local bike store, and put some tasteful strips of it on my frame and rims. Even the tiniest amount of light makes them glow. Most of all, they make it extremely obvious what I am and where I'm going.

Lights from igsport are quite good, have type-c charger and a universal mount (like bike conputers, action cameras, etc).

Anti-recommendation:

I bought Victoper lights - piece of cake to attach and run, and the light is decent, but the battery is weak, they almost run out of charge in about 20 minutes. I only spent $13 though, so I guess you get what you pay for.