Monthly issue
UK Bike Theft Report, September 2026
Published 2026-10-01. Figures are fixed at publication and will not change.
In September 2026, 1 in 82 used bikes checked by frame number on Cyclesite came back flagged against a stolen-bike registry or a rider-filed theft report, across 3,600 distinct bikes.
The month in figures
- Distinct bikes checked
- 3,600
- 4,123 checks in total; a bike checked twice counts once
- Distinct bikes flagged
- 44
- Matched a stolen-bike registry or a rider-filed report
- Flag rate
- 1 in 82
- Bikes flagged over bikes checked
- People checking
- at least 2,090
- Only visitors who consented to analytics or signed in are counted
- Frames registered by owners
- 125
- Thefts reported by riders
- 36
Distinct bikes checked changed +46.8% against the previous month.
Most checked makes
Where the frame number's format or a record identified the make. This is what buyers checked, not what was stolen; the registry could name a make for 18% of bikes checked this month.
- 1Trek154 bikes
- 2Cube142 bikes
- 3Specialized126 bikes
- 4Merida59 bikes
- 5Canyon36 bikes
Bike theft in the United Kingdom
National context for the figures above. These are official statistics for England and Wales, not Cyclesite data, and they cover a different population from the bikes checked here.
- Thefts recorded by police
- 56,835
- year ending March 2026, down 5.1% on the year before
- Thefts actually estimated
- 196,000
- Crime survey estimate for the same period, including thefts never reported
- Thefts reported to police
- 29%
- About 139,165 thefts a year are never reported
- Typical value of a stolen bike
- £250
- Median for year ending March 2025; the mean is £546, from a sample of 194 incidents
Recorded thefts fell while the survey estimate of actual thefts rose. Fewer thefts are being reported, not fewer thefts happening.
The mean is calculated on a small sample and moves several pounds either way between releases, so it should not be read as a trend. The median is the steadier figure.
Source: Office for National Statistics, Crime in England and Wales, licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
Cite this issue
Source: Cyclesite UK Bike Theft Report, September 2026. https://www.cyclesite.co.uk/uk-bike-theft-report/2026-09
Figures on this page are fixed. The live report at /uk-bike-theft-report updates continuously; cite an issue when the number must not move.
Methodology
- A check is one frame number submitted to the free Cyclesite stolen-bike checker during the calendar month, excluding cached re-reads and inputs that were not frame numbers.
- Bikes are counted by distinct frame number. The flag rate divides distinct flagged bikes by distinct checked bikes; it is never computed from check events.
- A flagged bike matched a stolen-bike registry or a theft report filed on Cyclesite. A clear result means no match was found in the sources consulted, which is not proof a bike was never stolen.
- The flag rate is published only when the month has at least 100 distinct bikes and at least 5 flagged; otherwise it is withheld.
- Makes come from the registry record for the frame, most often inferred from the serial number's manufacturer format, and are listed only with at least 10 bikes.
- Issues are written once and never recomputed. Corrections, if any, are published as a note, not as a changed number.
- National figures are official statistics for England and Wales, taken from the published crime tables and frozen into this issue at publication. The recorded and survey counts cover one period and the value figures a different, earlier one; both periods are stated beside the numbers. They describe the country, not Cyclesite traffic.
Press and data enquiries: press@cyclesite.co.uk