Bryton Gardia R300 Review: Sacrificing Safety for Savings?

Here's everything you need to know about the Bryton Garrdia RL cycling radar, and how it stands up to Garmin's existing Varia offering.

Last summer at Eurobike 2022 Bryton sorta-kinda-but-not-really announced their new Bryton Gardia R300 cycling radar. For those unfamiliar, a cycling radar detects overtaking vehicles (or cyclists/mopeds/etc…), and warns you on your bike computer/watch. At the time of announcement it represented an interesting option, as both Bryton and Magene were basically dual-announcing new radar units that were more budget-friendly than Garmin’s existing lineup of Varia radar units.  Bryton’s R300 has a list price of $129, whereas Garmin’s current generation Varia RTL-515 is $199 (albeit often lower, around $149).

However, as every media outlet pointed out at the time it was announced – this isn’t a category where a product can have certain types of bugs. A cycling radar has to have a perfect record at detecting overtaking vehicles. There’s no room for exceptions or occasional misses – or so-called ‘false negatives’.

And as you’ll see here, the Gardia R300 shows promise, but ultimately suffers from a number of bugs that need to be resolved before it can be recommended.

Finally, it’s worth pointing out that while you’re seeing an influx of media reviews released today due to a review embargo, the reality is that Bryton has been selling these units in Europe and Asia for months. Any consumer could have gone and bought these units in certain countries for many months. The point is, this unit isn’t actually being released today. It was released to regular consumers back in November/December in a number of countries.