Prescription Sunglasses

Does anyone have a recommendation for prescription sunnies? I've just not bothered for the last few years and end up squinting for most of my ride.

Im only mildly short sighted, but its enough that i get a headache if i ride without my glasses and cant pick out details in the middleground when going quick (especially offroad)

What are people using?

Id love something big and lary like Oakley Sutros, but it seems that bendy plastic makes crap lenses.

Wear a cap

I've been using a few glasses from here since around 2006. The website looks as bad as it did then, but the quality of the frames and lenses seems good

Just depends on if there's a style that you get on with, as there's certainly nothing very 'modern' looking

https://www.optilabs.com/product-category/sport/cycling-sunglasses/

Ask @cliveo

I’ve have Oakleys which I got through my optician. They are not cheap but very good. But as they say, buy cheap, buy twice. Having said that, when I need a new pair, I might well use Optilabs as I’ve heard good things about them from various people.

I have a couple of pairs of bolle, vortex and the sixth sense, which both take prescription inserts.
Bolle don’t do inserts anymore and you have to pay big money for all in one glasses/lenses.
I also have a pair of rayban Justin, which I put prescription lenses in at my local pharmacy/optician, and I use those for city pottering.

I sent my favourite sunnies off to Lensology and had them reglazed with transitions prescription lenses. (Quick to darken, slow to brighten)
Not that cheap but a good product and rejuvenated some favourite sunglasses with nice new lenses, but they give you a quote before starting work.
There’s a bit of a surcharge for sports / sweeping lenses, £25 for my Oakleys.
I wouldn’t opt for the top of the range transitions lenses which are supposed to darken behind windscreen glass. They don’t darken that much. I’d use ordinary dark lenses for driving.

I've just got some brand new Bolle sixth sense with gold to green mirror photochromic prescription lenses not inserts and they are great i really don't know why i waited this long either going without or faffing about with contacts and any day now I'm picking up some Oakley Trajectorys in clear to purple photochromic. Really expensive though and i don't think you can get Sutros with prescription lenses i think the only Oakley shield lenses for prescription are the Radar ev path. Same as Adroit says just go dark with driving glasses as the lense treatment to make them react behind glass makes them take longer to react and the mirrored Oakleys don't go fully clear so i went clear to purple for dark to medium conditions and sunny to bright sunny conditions are covered by the Bolle's. Bolle's we're £400 with loads of frame lense colour and shape options the Oakley were £500 with less prescription options. Pretty sure Bolle do the chronoshield in prescription lenses which may be the closest you can get to the Sutros if you like large shades. Also on shield type lenses Oakley and Bolle put the prescription lenses in with a cut out which you can see and it isn't flush. They have to do it this way because the prescription thickens the lense and if you do that to the whole lense with a shield it would require a custom frame. When they go dark you see the insert less and with mirrored finishes even less but they still don't look as good as regular shades so with glasses the have regular fit lenses like the Trajectorys they look just like regular sunglasses.

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Thanks for all this info - been looking to do exactly the same thing. If it helps, I've gone online to Selectspecs. Oakley Trajectorys, with basic single vision prescription lens, with green Transitions tint - £200. They seem to have a large range of Oakleys, but as Retro said, don't do Sutros with prescriptions.

£200 sounds like a bargain. My Trajectorys were £300 just for the lenses for single vision crystal clear to sapphire transitions but that is with Oakleys own toughened Plutonite lenses which i think was a £100 up charge. Now i know my new prescription I'll shop around online if i buy any more. I went through eyesite as they have a flagship store near me and i was able to try everything on and look at all the lense colour options which they showed me the transition of all of them with a UV torch they even ordered a pair of frames in for me just to try so i did get good service and it's nice to try before you buy when you're spending that kind of money. My price from eyesite does include a very good 2 yr scratch replacement policy for the lenses as well.

I use Boleos for years which came with insets. They stopped making them.

My prescription is so strong that the only solution was to go with a pair of Oakleys which look like regular rather than cycling sunglasses and come with transition lenses so I can wear them day or night. Unlike my regular glasses and sunglasses they are not varifocal as I find that varifocal lenses confuse me when it comes to looking at the ground and perception of height. This may just be me. That said, to deal with my prescription they are specially ground to be very thin and they cost around £600. The bulk of this cost was on lenses. I wear straps on them to keep them on my head in crashes as i don't want them to break. Not at that price.

Any particular straps you recommend? I'm going to be using my new Oakleys for mtb and running so i need them to stay on

Just got some elasticated ones off Amazon

Not a great photo

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Nice i might get a pair of Frogskins transitions for regular sunnies once I've paid these off and the sun comes out

Ray Ban Daddy-O, nice close fit and they don’t let air dry out your eyes.

Oakleys are stupidly overpriced and over rated.

I would love something big like those chronoshields. But the other ones look great.

I've seen you can get clip ins made for the Koo Demos so I may try those as I can get them cheap through work.

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I've never heard of Koo but those frames look nice and if you can get them cheap with inserts they could be well worth a try. I've never used inserts but i assume they're clear prescription glass inside a regular lense which i doubt is quite as good as a proper lenses as well as being heavier. How did @cornelius_blackfoot find inserts in use ?
I've used my regular glasses underneath/behind my Aerohead visor once and i got wierd flickers of glare between the two lenses and whilst the visor cleared fog ok my glasses didn't which i didn't like but maybe that was the two lenses were a bit far apart from each other or at 2 different angles or something which hopefully shouldn't occur with clip ins. My prescription is only - 2.0 left and - 0.75 right eye and first time wearing the Bolle's out on the bike was a a real wow moment for me.

These don't look half bad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0ZexaoIfQM&t=114s

The negatives of inserts:

Double fogging
Limited peripheral vision
Insects walking across the inner part
Can't cope with complex prescriptions

Positives:

Cheaper
Wrap around
Light
Can come with different coloured/changeable (and clear) sunglasses*

*As someone who cannot function without glasses, I find transition lenses the best choice for regular lenses or inserts

Another positive for regular no inserts is that they can be worn off the bike. The only thing I can't do with mine is read. But I would be happy driving or doing most other things. It means that if one is riding somewhere, it isn't always necessary to carry your usual glasses with you.

@cliveo makes all the relevant points about prescription inserts, I wear my bolle when I’m out doing miles (club runs, laps of Richmond park, unsanctioned TNRC) on the bike, use my prescription raybans for city miles when I take my normal glasses with me and swap over when I have to go into interiors/having a conversation so people can see my eyes..

I brought the bolle frames secondhand and got the inserts done at a bolle opticians, which was cheaper than getting everything through them. Inserts were £80 approx and the frames with coloured lenses were about £50 on eBay.

Rayban’s all in cost under a £100.

Would love to get some of the all in one prescription/photochromic lens but price tags of £300+ put me off. I can live with the few issues surrounding them..

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I tried the B-Rocks and they're really nice. Those fairings unclip on the arms if you want and they do some nice matt splatter/camo finish frames. Just picked up my Oakleys and checked out the chronoshields which are massive and the Shifters which are are pretty big and quite a bit cheaper. Those two are probably most modern if you like that almost ski goggle look like the Sutros.

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The shifters look really nice. But they are clip on only I think. Im leaning towards the Bolle B Rock. Shame about the available frame options though…

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The matt finishes like that grey do look much nicer than the gloss finishes and check if Bolle direct can do prescription options as they have 40% off the B-Rock pros on their website at the moment. I still might get a pair of the B-Rocks in the matt green like these as they perfectly match my mtb

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