Cycling Emerges as a Favorite Hobby During COVID-19: OLX

On World Bicycle Day, India’s leading platform for the sale and purchase of pre-owned goods, OLX India today said that it’s platform has witnessed a bike boom, which confirms the emergence of cycling as a new favorite hobby during COVID-19. As per the data on OLX, the demand for pre-owned cycles grew by 100 per cent, with the number of unique interactions between a lister and interested users going up by 126 per cent as compared to pre-COVID-19 data.

As COVID-19 disrupted everyday movement and led to temporary closure of fitness centres, consumers have turned to cycling to meet their fitness and commuting needs, aligned with the government’s safety and social-distancing protocols. This new trend also shows a growing desire among people to opt for green choices to help the environment heal.

Users from Delhi-NCR registered the highest demand, more than 100 per cent increase for pre-owned cycles on OLX. Mumbai ranked a close second, with a 83 per cent surge in demand for pre-owned bicycles. Kolkata, Hyderabad and Bengaluru followed in their demand for pre-owned cycles, in that order respectively.

The supply (new listings) for cycles on OLX went up by 49 per cent, which clearly indicates that that demand far exceeded supply, with users clearly preferring to put their cycles to better use during this time. Hero and Hercules brand of cycles emerged as the most popular brands on OLX.

Sunny Kataria, Head Commercial Excellence, OLX India said, “The bicycle signifies a more sustainable means of transport that is not only good for people but for the environment and the economy too. The World Bicycle Day recognizes the synergy between the bicycle and the user to foster creativity and social engagement. OLX, by virtue of its transaction volume, does provide a window into this trend. With the accelerated push of cycling, following the pandemic-induced lockdown, pre-owned cycles have moved from good-to-have to must-have for our users.”

OLX studied its platform data of the demand and supply of cycles from October 2019 to March 2020, the pre-COVID baseline, with the post-lockdown period of June 2020 to March 2021 to confirm this growing trend.

About OLX India

OLX is India’s number one consumer-to-consumer marketplace for pre-owned cars and motorbikes, mobile phones, household items and also for jobs and real estate. In India, it already has 85% market share of the C2C online trade, 80% of the omni channel pre-owned cars market share via OLX Autos while OLX People and waah Jobs has emerged as the leading blue & grey collar jobs recruitment marketplace in India.

OLX is the number #1 buying + selling mobile App in India, according to Google Play Store and is currently trending at 7 billion page-views a month.