Based on a bike fitting and many years experience I’m pretty clear on the optimum saddle height for me on the road. When I first got into riding off-road (a couple of years ago) I set my saddle at the same height, but over the years it has slowly been getting lower (not slipping, just me setting it lower). So, even though I have a dropper fitted, at full extension it is now about an inch lower than I use on the road. Just wondered if this is normal.

Pretty normal I’d say. Not an inch but my mtb saddle is 15mm lower than the road bike.

About 1-2cm for me. But then I spend a lot of time standing up off road on a HT so don’t really find it an issue.

on trail centres even without big drops it needs to be lowered as generally you (well I do at least) pedal standing up so the bikes bumping around all over.

when i had my bike fit the guy doing it said it’s normal to set a mtb seat back and down a bit compared to a road bike.

Not sure why though…

Same height for me. 😕
Hadn’t noticed a problem.

No, mines the same, road & mtb.
Maybe a very slight difference, but it’s not deliberate.
Get sore knees otherwise.

get a dropper seatpost

Ive got a 3 position gravity dropper

max height for road and smooth climbs/trails

1 inch drop for general trail riding

all the way down for tricky descents/ jumps etc

Same height on both. No issues and no need for a dropper!

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Same height on both. No issues and no need for a dropper!

I thought like that once, but did the 70K rough ride xc route a few months back on my hardtail with normal seatpost, really missed the dropper even on relatively tame stuff, you can hit stuff that much harder with more standover and a lower COG

Same height? I’ve no idea what that means. Same distance from pedal to saddle? Same distance from ground to saddle?

Same height. saddle to pedal. I.E leg extension

Assuming you mean BB centre to saddle. A bit lower than road on the XC FS, a lot lower on the trail hardtail, and a dropper on the big FS.

Same on all bikes.

Same for me on my rigid cx and hardtail though I’d like to try a dropper on the hardtail. I’m waiting for an xc specific lightweight cheap and reliable one with just a couple of inches of drop. 🙂