Ready to get out for short bike rides around the neighborhood with your little one? Want to be able to keep an eye on them while you do it? The WeeRide Kangaroo child bike seat is a popular and very affordable option. In our review below, we’ll cover everything you need to know to determine if the Kangaroo will fit your bike and your child.
To eliminate any confusion off the bat, the WeeRide Kangaroo is the same as the Kazam Kangaroo. Kazam recently purchased WeeRide, and is rebranding all of their products. The WeeRide or Kazam Kangaroo is also the same product as the Kazam WeeRide Wallaby. The Wallaby is sold at Walmart, while the Kangaroo is sold on Amazon. Got it? Let’s dive in!
WeeRide Kangaroo Overview
RATING: Recommended
MSRP: $79
BEST FOR: Ages 1 to 3 in cooler environments as seat tends to get sweaty. Parents that are less confident on a bike.
MOUNT TYPE: Front frame, no quick release
AGE RANGE: 12 months to 33 lbs.
PROS:
- Super stable seat aids balance of adult rider
- Comfortable, padded center pedestal provides a place for kids to place their hands or rest heads
- Lower price compared to other well-known child carrier brands
- Made of durable, weather resistant plastic shell
- Cushioning seat
- Highly adjustable (footrests, shoulder, waist straps, distance from handlebars are all adjustable for the size of your toddler to maximize comfort and security)
CONS:
- The large size and placement of the carrier interferes with adult getting on the bike and makes steering and pedaling more cumbersome
- Requires time and tools to attach and remove – no quick release
- Materials feel cheap, buckles and clips are made of very lightweight plastic
Kazam Weeride Kangaroo Models
This review is based on the 2021 Kazam Kangaroo models. Older models were called the WeeRide Kangaroo, the Kazam WeeRide Kangaroo, or the WeeRide LTD Kangaroo. We will refer to the seat as a Kazam or WeeRide Kangaroo throughout this review.
WeeRide-branded Kangaroo seats are still available on Amazon, but any new model will be called by the Kazam name. There are currently four different models of this seat available in the US market.
(1) Kazam Kangaroo Classic, $69 on Amazon
(2) Kazam Kangaroo Deluxe, $89 on Amazon – padding is nicer and can be removed for washing
(3) Kazam Wallaby Classic – same as the Kangaroo classic, but sold at Walmart
(4) Kazam Wallaby Deluxe – same as the Kangaroo Deluxe, but sold at Walmart
WeeRide Kangaroo Review – Results of our Test Rides
If you ask our toddler what he thought of his first ride in the WeeRide Kangaroo, he would throw his thumb up in the air and tell you that it was AWESOME! When it comes to riding with toddlers, what more do we really need to talk about??
Usually when we are on rides that go beyond what our toddler can handle with his balance bike, we strap him into our trusty Burley D’Lite, a comfortable bike trailer that has lasted through 3 older siblings and is still going strong. However, our adventurous little guy (who thinks he is already a big boy) sometimes gets bored inside the trailer and can resist.
We have tried rear-mounted child seats in the past and after testing the WeeRide Kangaroo, we discovered that we much prefer a front-mounted seat option. From a parent’s perspective, this setup makes it easier to balance the bike, and our little loved one is much more accessible for cuddles and on-bike interaction.
Our toddler had much more fun interacting, calling out things he was seeing along the way, and feeling the wind in his face. All better alternatives than staring at my backside!
Drawbacks in a Nutshell
However, as much fun and as exciting of a ride as it was for our little guy, this front-mount bike seat does have some drawbacks for mom and dad that are important to consider when thinking about purchasing the Kangaroo.
That said, we need to point out that this is the most affordable front-mounted baby seat on the market, so a lower price will be worth a little extra hassle for many parents.
Bulky Seat Makes Bike Handling Difficult
The biggest drawback is on the fit and handling aspects for mom or dad. The Kangaroo is rather large and bulky and sits closer to the adult rider than other front-mount bike seats. This creates a real obstacle for pedaling, making tight turns, or getting on and off the bike. More on this in the Adult Rider Comfort section below.
Difficult to Attach and Remove from Bike
The other ding on the Kangaroo is the mounting system. We found the mounting bracket to be limited to the number of bikes it can attach to without an adaptor which much be purchased separately.
Additionally, it takes both time and tools to attach or remove the seat. This may not matter to you if you plan on mounting it and leaving it. But for us, we vary our setups regularly based on where we are going, how far and hard we want to work, and basically whether our kids are in a good mood or not.
We value the flexibility of being able to adjust on the go, and the WeeRide Kangaroo’s setup is definitely not easily adjustable or removable. My husband, who is quite handy and fancies himself an amateur bike mechanic, timed the install to just under 5 minutes, and removal was slightly less than that. Many competitor models have quick release options that take 5 seconds to get the seat on and off your bike.
Compatibility – Will the WeeRide Kangaroo Fit on Your Bike?
Before any of the rest of this review even matters to you, you have to determine if the WeeRide Kangaroo will fit on your bike. As with any child bike seat, finding one that mounts to your specific bike is always the biggest challenge.
Unique Center Mounting System
The WeeRide Kangaroo has a mounting system that is different than any other baby bike seat. Most traditional front-mounted seats have a mounting bracket that attaches to the headset of the bike. The Kangaroo’s mounting system places a bar in between your seat post and your head tube (right below the headset).
As a result, while most front mount seats turn with the handlebars, the Weeride Kangaroo stays stationary and centered on your bike when you turn. Your baby’s weight never moves, which is actually a huge bonus for your center of gravity and balance.
On the flip side, this does make the seat incompatible with “cruiser” style bikes with swept-back handlebars. Since the seat stays put during a turn, the handlebar grips can actually swing around and hit the child when turning.
Attaching the Kangaroo to your Bike
The WeeRide Kangaroo’s mounting bar attaches in two places on your bike – the seat post in the rear, and the head tube in the front. In order for the Kangaroo to fit on your bike, there must be a minimum level of clearance (5mm according to the manufacturer) on your seat post and at the top of your bike’s head tube for the mounting clamps.
You cannot mount the front clamp to your bike’s handlebar stem because it would prevent you from being able to turn the handlebars.
If you don’t have enough room on your headtube to mount, the WeeRide front-mounted seat has an optional mounting adapter for threadless headsets. The adapter consists of a single spacer that you install on your steertube as a replacement for one of the current spacers.
Installing the spacer does require removing the handlebars, so be sure to know how to properly and safely reinstall the handlebars on a bike before you take them off!
Once the spacer is installed, simply remove the smaller, thinner plastic spacer inside the front clamp of the seat’s mounting bar (the plastic insert closest to the “FRONT” marking on the bar, marked with red arrow below). Once removed, wrap the clamp around the groved spacer, making sure the end of the bar is placed inside the spacers’ groves, and then tighten.
In our real-life testing, about half of our adult bikes did not have adequate space to mount this seat and would have required the spacer, which is available for $10 directly from Kazam.
Mounting the opposite end of the mounting bar to the seat post tube is really easy. Simply remove your seat post and then loosen the bolt enough on the clamp to allow the seat post to slide through and then retighten.
As we mentioned, this process of attaching or removing the seat takes time and tools and is a pain if it’s something you’ll want to do often.
If you still have no idea if your bike will fit with the WeeRide Kangaroo, please check out our article How To Choose: Child Bike Seats where we explain more about bike fit difficulties with child bike seats.
Adjusting the Seat Position for a Best Fit
Once the mounting bar is installed on the bike, there is a simple hand screw method of installing the Kangaroo seat to the mounting bar. This feature is nice because you have some adjustability for the positioning of the actual seat along the bar. Depending on your bike, your size, and your child’s size, you can loosen the screw and slide the seat forward or back to ensure comfort for both baby and adult rider.
Kangaroo Adjusted Closer and Away from Adult Rider
The downside of this system is that this single screw is the only thing that attaches the seat to the mounting bar. In addition to the screw being slightly shorter than we prefer, the knob to loosen this screw is placed at the base of the child’s seat and easily within reach.
As a result, be sure to tighten the screw all the way down, especially with older toddlers, as it is possible for a child to essentially detach the entire seat from the mounting bar if they were to play with the knob. If this were to happen, the footrest would prevent the seat from falling off the bar, but the seat could unexpectedly tilt to one side or slide back towards the adult rider mid-ride.
We should note that while the seat was fairly intuitive to install, if any parents out there get stuck, there are convenient instructional videos available online that walk through the setup and troubleshooting process.
Adult Rider Comfort
The WeeRide Kangaroo sits in between the saddle and the handlebars, over the bike’s top tube and pretty close to the adult rider. Most other front-mounted seats are mounted on the handlebars, farther away from the adult.
The Kangaroo’s placement, as well as its wide profile and square back, make it significantly more bulky and obtrusive than other front-mounted options like the Thule Yepp Nexxt Mini or Peg Perego Orion. I am a tall woman (5’9”) on a bike with a medium-sized frame, and in order to ride comfortably I needed to scoot back on my saddle and ride with my legs more open than usual so that my knees didn’t hit the seat.
This is fine for short rides around the neighborhood, but if you want to go more than a few miles, I would suggest a smaller seat, a rear child bike seat, or even a bike trailer where your pedaling motion and steering ability are not limited by a large seat taking up space.
To be fair, rider space is a very common issue with front-mounted seats. However, it’s a bit more exaggerated with the Weeride Kangaroo.
Despite this drawback, there is one huge benefit of the Kangaroo’s placement for the adult rider. The child’s weight is more centered on the bike, making balancing while riding with your child much more natural. Additionally, because the Kangaroo doesn’t turn with the handlebars, your child’s weight always stays centered on the bike. For less-confident adult riders, this can be extremely helpful.
Size and Age of Child
All models of the Kangaroo have a listed age recommendation range of 8 months to 33 pounds. However, we strongly encourage you to wait to use any baby bike seat until your child is 12 months old. 12 months is also the age that is recommend by the American Academy of Pediatrics.
By 12 months, most babies’ necks are strong enough to firmly hold up their head as well as the additional weight of a helmet. You also need to consider that a child as young as 8 months probably won’t fit in any baby bike helmets yet… and of course you should never ride with a child on your bike without a helmet! (Also, in some states it’s actually illegal to ride with a child under the age of 1.)
Front-mounted seats are smaller than rear-mounted seats because they have to fit between the adult rider and the bike’s handlebars. Almost all front-mounted seats are designed for babies and toddlers about 1 to 3 years old. Rear-mounted seats can be bigger because there’s more room in the rear of a bike, so they typically fit kids longer, up to 4 or 5 years old.
Our primary tester for the WeeRide was almost 3 years old and in the 90th percentile for height and weight. He fit very comfortably in the seat once we adjusted for maximum space in the harness and footrests, and was clearly at the upper end of the tolerances for this model.
In fact, only after we tested him out on the seat, we discovered that he had grown quite a bit recently and weighs 42 lb., 9 lb. over the recommended weight limit! While we had no issues with the performance of the seat and felt safe with our son while riding, we highly suggest weighing your child before your order any front-mounted seat to ensure they aren’t over the 33 lb. weight limit.
As a comparison, our 25 lb., 24-month-old “tester” in 18-month clothes certainly had more room for growth than our older tester, but also wasn’t swimming in the seat. She fit comfortably and was more than happy to sit in the seat. Unfortunately, she wasn’t keen on keeping her helmet on, so we didn’t have a chance to take her out for a ride.
Fitting Your Child with the Kangaroo
The Kangaroo features a 5-point harness system, but it’s pretty basic. The straps are made of standard nylon webbing and the lengths of the shoulder and waist straps are adjustable via basic sliders. We were able to adjust the straps to fit our testers, but compared to other seats, the process was a bit tricky, especially with a wiggly toddler!
Shoulder Strap Height Adjustability
Shoulder straps on lower-end child bike seats are notorious for sliding off a child’s shoulders. Without the shoulder strap securely positioned on top of a child’s shoulders, the effectiveness of the bike seat harness is certainly weakened.
Straps sliding down is usually the result of the insertion points for the shoulder straps being too low. When the straps start too low, they have to first travel up to the top of the child’s shoulders and then back down to the buckle. As a result, the straps can easily and quickly fall off.
To combat this problem, Kazam includes a small Velcro shoulder tension strap to prevent the shoulder straps from sliding off the shoulders. Unfortunately, we didn’t find this solution to work very well. The straps still fall down unless the tension strap is high on the shoulder blades. But there’s no way to keep the tension strap high… it slides down, just like the shoulder straps themselves.
During our testing, we also quickly realized that since the shoulder tension strap easily blends into the harness, you might not notice it’s there. When loading up your child, if you don’t take the time to search for and attach the tension strap, it’s pretty easy to forget about it!
Buckle
Overall, we found that the buckle on this seat left much to be desired. The plastic feels too lightweight to be durable and withstand the test of time being buckled and unbuckled in a hurry. Additionally, it was not intuitive to use.
On the front of the buckle is a big grey circle that one might assume is the means for releasing the straps from the buckling mechanism. However, that circle is purely decorative, and the actual release of the straps is done by pressing the small black buttons around the outside of the decorative circle.
Weeride Kangaroo – Other Features to Consider
The remaining features we’ll discuss aren’t as important as those already mentioned, but are worth considering nonetheless.
Seat Construction and Venting
The WeeRide Kangaroo is made of a hard, molded plastic shell that proved to be fairly durable and scratch-resistant, and the seat itself has a small foam cushion that is removable. The cushion has a soft (but lint and dirt-attracting) fabric on one side and is smooth on the back. The cushion isn’t attached to the seat, so it often pulls forward on its own.
There are no ventilation holes along the back of the seat, which does make the seat a bit sweaty when used in warmer weather.
Front Pedestal
One of the unique features of the Kangaroo is its front pedestal or “dashboard”. Some front baby bike seats have handlebars for a child to hold onto, but this dashboard is different.
The front dashboard can provide a buffer and safety barrier in between a child’s face and the handlebars in case of a quick stop or crash. It also serves as a resting cushion.
Our tester was able to put his head down on the dashboard when he was tired of waving to neighbors or cars passing by. We also found that it helped keep his long arms off the bike’s handlebars while we were in motion, which was definitely a concern as we first started to use a front-mounted child carrier.
Depending on your bike, child’s age, as well as your child’s comfort level, the WeeRide seat can also be used without the dashboard. Removing the dashboard can’t be done on the fly as it requires removing the seat from the mounting bar in order to unscrew it.
Foot Rests
The footrests on the WeeRide Kangaroo are height-adjustable and can easily be adjusted on the fly. The longest footrest position, however, is pretty short though. In fact, although almost a year apart in age, both of our testers use the footrest at the lowest position. Considering the highest position is just below the bend for the knee, the upper positions are not practical.
More like giant foot cups, the footrests were big enough for our tester to keep his foot in while barefoot, wearing his favorite rain boots, and in regular sneakers.
However, with no foot straps on the latest Kangaroo model (2021), a child’s foot is free to come out of the foot cups. Those little feet can end up on your handlebars, which happened to us the very first time we took our tester out for a ride.
To be fair, this is an issue that we haven’t seen anyone solve completely, even with foot straps, so just know that little feet on your handlebars is a potential downside for any front-mounted seat.
The best thing you can do is make your child wear shoes and keep reminding them to keep their feet down. Once we put shoes on our tester, the added bulk made it easier to keep the foot contained in the footrest and after (several) reminders we were able to ride without an issue.
WeeRide Kangaroo Bottom Line
The Kangaroo certainly has its flaws, but for less than our family of 6 eats at Chick Fil A, it’s also a bang for your buck. We still prefer our rear-mounted seat or bike trailer for long rides, but for a quick family trip to the ice cream shop, the WeeRide Kangaroo does the trick.
While our almost 3-year-old loved the experience of being upfront and interacting with everyone on our family rides, it was not as much fun for mommy given the large footprint that got in the way of steering and pedaling, as well as the inexpensive construction – especially of the shoulder straps and buckle.
So who is the Kangaroo best for? For parents who are a bit nervous about riding their bike with their child, the Kangaroo’s centered, stationary placement makes balancing considerably easier!
FTC Disclosure: Affiliate links are included in this review. No monetary compensation was provided for this review but Two Wheeling Tots received product from Kazam to facilitate this review. All opinions and images are that of Two Wheeling Tots LLC. All content and images are copyrighted and should not be used or replicated in any way. View our Terms of Use.
