Vel 100 Lumen Front Light

The Vel 100 Lumen Front Light is excellent for commuting or road riding. Bright enough for daytime – at least for shorter rides – neatly made and packaged with several easy mounting options, it's a tidy, lightweight safety lamp. It can't quite match its bigger siblings for materials and design, and the charge indicator can be misleading, but otherwise it's great.

Vel's 100 is the least powerful of its front lights, but also the smallest. At just 25g ready to go, it provides a choice of four modes – the usual high and low output, solid or flashing options – to meaningfully increase your chances of being seen in either daylight or streetlamp darkness.

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Surprisingly, its most power-hungry mode outshone (thangyouverymuch, I'm here all week) the spec sheet considerably, lasting 30-40 minutes beyond the claimed hour. What's more, even the slowest method of charging (via USB from a computer with the supplied lead) only takes an hour, making this very usable for office commuters. The wraparound lens and side cutouts mean visibility is good towards drivers in junctions, too, which is just what you need.

Less good is the battery indicator, which is an LED dot in the large, rubber-covered and water-resistant on/off switch. While it's clearly visible the whole time, even in bright sunlight, I found it almost impossible to distinguish between orange (25-49% charge) and red (24-0%).

On the upside, it's not going to trick you into running flat when you thought it was OK. On the downside, I spent most rides wondering if it was about to die from about 30 minutes in (on high beam), which is when it turns orange. Or maybe red. It's worth noting that the 300 Lumen version uses the same system, but never gave me any trouble with colours.

Mounting

The Vel comes with several mounting options. The main one is a plastic bar mount with a large, easy-to-grab silicone strap. The plastic part has two sets of hooks, to accommodate both standard and skinny bars. The lamp keys to this with a 90 degree twist, and while it's entirely stable and secure in normal use, it's only plastic-on-plastic friction keeping it from untwisting (in either direction). Knock it accidentally to 90 degrees and it will simply fall off.

Cleverly, the base is also a clip that can be slid pretty securely onto any webbing straps, or very securely onto the supplied Velcro strap. The Velcro is a good length for looping into vented helmets, and in this configuration the whole thing is an imperceptible 21g. You're not going to see with it in the dark, but it will get you seen. It even comes with a zip-tie for (slightly) more town security on bars, and a rubber shim for paint protection.

At £20 the price is good, and compares well with similar lamps – the £25 Giant Recon HL 100, for instance, or Lezyne's more powerful but bigger and heavier KTV Drive 200 (also £25). In fact, it's much easier to spend way more than £20 than it is to spend less.

> Buyer's Guide: The best 2019/2020 front lights for cycling

While the Vel 100 has the same charging issue as the Vel 300 – your phone chargers are likely to be too powerful, as Vel says anything but QC1.0 could damage it (new phones are on QC3.0) – it only takes an hour in a computer to charge from totally flat anyway. That, plus the 100's niche as a commuting or auxiliary light rather than a main lamp you're seriously relying on, means it's less likely to be a problem.

The Vel 100 is a small, lightweight safety light with a good build and a selection of intelligent mounting options. It's weather-resistant and very easy to use: bar the slightly confusing indicator light, it's a very easy light to recommend.

Verdict

Bright, lightweight safety lamp at a great price