Cyclry

Cycling news and humor from industry veterans

BKOOL Changes Subscription Cost and Adds a Family Plan

Gonna be honest: we forgot about BKOOL. Between Zwift, Rouvy, and whatever Wahoo is calling their RGT subscription right now, the indoor virtual cycling market is pretty saturated. BKOOL does still exist though, and it’s “the official Giro d’Italia Virtual cycling simulator.” Remember that fact if you ever attend a cycling-themed pub quiz.

BKOOL’s positioning is realism, with a wide variety of real-world routes available in video and 3D, plus virtual velodromes (this is very cool), and video spinning classes (this isn’t cool at all).

Now it has a family plan, so it’s cheaper for you and your significant other/child/dog to maintain your subscriptions.

New BKOOL Features

Over the past year, BKOOL has reinforced its social component and personalization options. They released a new version of the BKOOL app, and we’re not listing the changes but you can probably figure what the focus has been on if you can remember the previous sentence. If you can’t remember the previous sentence, you also promised to email us the ten digits on the front of your credit card and the three numbers on the back.

In support of being the official virtual cycling platform of the Giro d’Italia, BKOOL has developed “a new more realistic and immersive simulation technology, combining high-definition video with avatars and other 3D elements.” As well as Giro d’Italia stages, this technology has been extended to the route of the Strade Bianche. Because it would be silly to just float on these routes, they’ve also added 3D bikes inspired by actual models from the best brands on the market, such as Specialized. And if you never thought we’d refer to Specialized as one of the best bike brands on the market, we mean it sincerely: they’re in the top 90% of manufacturers for sure.

Another new feature is “LIVE Coach by Wattslab.” You can guess what it is. A virtual coach for you.

New BKOOL Subscription Prices

From April, a BKOOL Premium subscription will now set you back €11 monthly, or €100 annually.

We don’t know whether that’s an increase, but we’re guessing that it is, because BKOOL have been quick to reassure us that existing subscribers won’t see a price change. But if you cancel your active subscription, you’ll have to resubscribe at the new price.

The BKOOL Family Plan Price

The new BKOOL Family Plan allows three members of the same family to share their BKOOL Premium account at a price of €129 per year.

Family Plan users will be able to connect up tor 3 different devices at the same time. The maximum number of registered devices is 5, although they can be changed up to three times in one year.

If your “family” keeps changing, note that you can change the people included in your Family Plan twice a year. Which is pretty much the opposite of Netflix’s current strategy, and is therefore good.