All other things being equal, is there any difference between the following methods of raising the handlebar height?

– More spacers below stem
– Stem with an increased angle
– Riser bars with more rise

Thanks

All the same. Shuffling spacers is cheapest if you have enough steerer length.

Think you’ve sorted the options, just need to figure out what it will cost to achieve the same thing.

They’re not all the same at all

Higher rise bars, raise the height of your bars. Cockpit length should remain the same, but the relative angle between bars and front hub steepens for the downhills because they make the effective steering length of your stem longer as the bars are raised vertically, not in line with your head angle
Uphill you’ll have less weight on the front wheel because the raised bars effectively go further back when uphill

More spacers below the stem force the bars back and giving less cockpit space and less weight on the front wheel for climbing, but doesn’t affect the angle between bars and front hub

Increased stem angle (assuming same length stem) makes the effective steering length of your stem shorter. It raises the bars and brings them back. So shortened cockpit and less weight of front wheel whilst climbing

Basically, the lower the better, so long as your back, wrists and neck can stand it imo/ime

If the contact point I.e. the grips end up in the same position (relative to the front axle, if you like), then it makes no difference how that is achieved. James’ point is that 1cm extra rise bars is not necessarily the same as sticking a 1cm spacer under the stem, which strikes me as possibly being rather pedantic but he talks truth.

Sticking a 10mm spacer under the stem will move the bars backwards by 3.4mm and up by 9.4mm (assuming a 70º head angle for ease of calculation)