Gear Ratio Range Explained

A hub's range tells you how far apart its lowest and highest gears are. The number of speeds tells you how many steps sit in between. They're two different things, and a seller may only mention one.

Gear ratio in plain words

Wikipedia says a shifting mechanism "allows selection of the appropriate gear ratio for efficiency or comfort under the prevailing circumstances"¹. A low ratio is for slow, heavy work such as a hill. A high ratio is for speed.

What "range" means

Range is the highest gear compared with the lowest. For one 14-speed hub, Wikipedia says: "The overall gear range is 526%, meaning the highest gear is 5.26 times as high as the lowest gear"². So 526% is a ratio of about five and a quarter to one, not a speed.

The same page gives the hub's inner gear ratio. That's the turns of the hub shell per turn of the sprocket. It "lies between 0.279 and 1.467 depending on the gear chosen"². A figure under 1 means the wheel turns slower than the sprocket. Over 1 means faster.

Your final ratio also depends on the front chainring, the rear sprocket and the wheel size. The hub only sets one part of it. Wikipedia lists several ways to state a ratio, such as gear inches, metres of development and tooth counts¹. When two sellers quote different units, you can't compare them directly.

Figures published for a few hubs

These are descriptions from Wikipedia and not test results. Different model years of a hub can differ, so use the maker's current spec sheet for any hub you're considering.

Step size

Spacing matters as well as range. Wikipedia says racing cyclists "often have gears with a small relative difference of around 7% to 10%"¹. It says mountain and hybrid bikes "often have gears with a moderate relative difference of around 15%"¹. Wikipedia says a 14-speed hub offers "an average relative difference of 13.6%"¹.

A wide range with few speeds means bigger jumps between gears. A narrow range with many speeds means smaller jumps over a shorter spread.

Questions to ask

• What range does the maker publish for this exact hub?
• How many speeds, and how big is each step?
• What chainring and sprocket sizes does the bike come with? They shift the whole range up or down.
• Is there a hill or load that you know you'll face often? Check the lowest gear against it.

Skip any seller figure that doesn't say what it measures. A bare speed count or range percentage tells you little until you know the unit and the exact hub it belongs to.