Magicshine MJ-900

The Magicshine MJ-900 is a reasonably powerful front light that comes in a tiny, lightweight package, pitched at an attractive price point. On the whole it looks pretty good and there is a lot to like. The only real thorn in its side is the average beam pattern.

Cycle lighting technology moves fast; even four or five years ago you would have struggled to get a durable 1200-lumen front light for anywhere near a hundred quid, let alone half that. But that's exactly what Magicshine has achieved here with its MJ-900.

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It doesn't weigh a lot, just 190g, which is pretty impressive for an external battery system, and the head unit is so tiny it doesn't take up much real estate on your handlebar – an important consideration with Garmins and the like taking over the cockpit.

The head unit is fitted in place with a simple o-ring, which makes attaching and removing the light a simple operation, ideal if you need to leave your bike somewhere public. The downside is that road vibrations make it creep around the bar, normally backwards so that the beam continues to rise higher into the sky. On really rough roads you have to constantly adjust it.

The hard body battery pack is held in place with a wide Velcro strap and it gives a much more secure fit. The battery pack itself has a curved cutout on the bottom with a rubber insert, so it's perfect for attaching to the top tube or under the stem.

While we're on the subject of the battery pack, it has a 2.6Ah 7.4W capacity, which will chuck out full power for 2hrs 18mins – if you're lucky. The best I got was 1hr 56mins and up to 10 minutes less sometimes. The on/off button illuminates when the light is on, turning brighter when the battery has about 20 minutes left so you do get some warning.

On my first ride with the MJ-900 I used the 50% mode for the majority of the time; that should have given me a smidge over 4hrs, but I got 2hrs 8mins before it died. Things improved over time, but it still wasn't really a light I felt like trusting on a reasonably long ride.

To increase burn times you can upgrade the battery pack: a 4.4Ah is £19.99 and a 6.6Ah is £39.99.

The light has four modes: 100% (1200 lumen), 50% (600 lumen), 30% (360 lumen) and flash. When you turn on the MJ-900 it starts off in 100% and a single touch of the button scrolls through the modes. It's really easy to set up and use, but one issue is that you have to scroll through 'off' if you are in one of the lower modes and want to get back to full. Not ideal in any situation really.

The beam pattern isn't ideal either, especially on the road – it's nothing more than a glorified torch really. A lot of people criticise lights that cost hundreds of pounds, but in many cases a large portion of that money goes on the reflector R&D – that's how the likes of Hope and Exposure really make the most out of the available lumens.

The full mode here is a claimed 1200 lumen, but what the MJ-900 actually achieves with that is very little with its 20-degree beam angle. Out on the road you get a very bright central spot with a lot of light bleed around the edges – basically illuminating everything from the road surface to the tops of the trees. You can never get the position quite right – you're either lighting up your front tyre or birds' nests.

You need to have it on full mode all the time to see where you are going in the dark, and by doing so you're also irritating those coming towards you.

> Check out our guide to the best front lights and our beam comparison engine here

The build quality seems pretty good – I can't see anything that would suggest it's going to fall apart any time soon. It stood up to heavy rain as well with no issues and no water getting into any connection points or the main body.

In conclusion, the Magicshine MJ-900 is light, easy to use and reasonably priced, but in terms of illumination you're better off spending a little bit more on something more refined, beam-wise. Here, there is so much light going off in all directions that it really irritates oncoming drivers, and if you dip the light down the bright centre spot ends up too close to your front wheel to be able to see far enough up the road. If you ride a lot on quiet, unlit country lanes, canal paths, that type of thing it's fine, but anywhere there is likely to be a lot of oncoming traffic the Magicshine is quite antisocial.

Verdict

Solid construction and easy to use, but a primitive beam pattern