Mountain Bike Suspension Types Explained

At Westbrook Cycles, we aim to create a wide range of content around all different cycling disciplines and topics, with mountain bike content being an essential part of it. We have written before about the various types of mountain bikes available on the market, with the likes of hardtail and complete suspension bikes being discussed, alongside the features and benefits of each kind of bike being discussed at length. In this post, we look at full-suspension mountain bikes in greater detail, examining the designs found exclusively on full-suspension mountain bikes.

In this post, we run through some of the most popular and commonly seen suspension designs on the trails, looking at some design characteristics and what they mean to you as a rider. Although we get asked plenty of times, there’s no such thing as the best suspension design - different designs work in various ways, but all are trying to achieve the same thing: balance out comfort and performance. Other factors mountain bike companies consider when designing suspension include pedalling efficiency, absorption of different impacts, stiffness, weight, cost and maintenance.

One of the best ways of thinking about suspension design is how companies and brands mount their rear suspension shocks on the bike's frame.

Single Pivot MTB Suspension

Single-pivot mountain bike suspension is found on almost all Orange Mountain Bikes. It’s one of the most straightforward suspension designs available, which is good news for those living in muddy and wet climates such as the UK—where the easier a bike is to clean, the better!

A single-pivot suspension design has only one pivot point - the rear axle of the MTB is connected to the front of the triangle by a swing arm, and the rear shock is linked to/mounted to the swing arm itself.

This simple design makes the suspension feel incredibly predictable and consistent, allowing the rider to have complete confidence. Unsurprisingly, because of the suspension’s simplistic design, bike brands have less flexibility in what they can do with it regarding anti-rising and squatting—meaning other, more sophisticated suspension designs provide greater control and greater capacity for tuning.

Flex Stay/Linkage Driven Single Pivot

Linkage-driven single-pivot suspension has a rear axle connected to the front triangle's central pivot - much like a single-pivot suspension. However, this type of suspension uses some additional linkages and pivots that drive the rear shock. This allows the bike manufacturer to use different types of shocks while also increasing the suspension's tunability. This design is often popular with XC bikes and enduro mountain bikes.

Many Linkage-Driven Single Pivot suspension designs also work with a Flex Stay Design, which uses flex in the seat stays or the rear triangle of the bike to assist the suspension in its operation.

Horst Link/Four Bar

Horst link suspension is one of the most common and popular suspension designs found on mountain bikes. Horst link suspension was first designed and developed for motorbikes in the 1970s, and it made its way onto mountain bikes in 1985.Horst link suspension, also unknown as four bar suspension, is most often found on longer travel mountain bikes, such as trail and enduro mountain bikes. Although the design of the Horst suspension is old, it’s a design which with changes, has stood the test of time, and this suspension type still provides a tuneable, sensitive and reliable suspension design.

The easiest way to spot Horst Suspension is to look for the pivot on the chainstay itself, infront of the bike's rear axle.

Maestro Suspension/Twin Link/Dual Link

Twin-link/dual-link suspension uses a rear triangle that moves on a pair of links connected to the front triangle. This suspension setup and design have many different names, but above, we have chosen to incorporate Giant’s name for this design on their mountain bikes: Maestro. Various designs use twin-link suspension with different formats, but the basic principles of the design remain the same. The design of the twin-link suspension is also incredibly similar to that of the Horst suspension, enjoying the same high levels of adjustability and tuneability - leading to twin-link suspension designs being used on a wide array of different types of mountain bikes, including short-travel XC bikes right across to gravity centric bikes such as downhill bikes.

Split Pivot/Concentric

Split Pivot suspension designs are known by several different brand-specific terms. In this case, Orbea calls their split pivot suspension design Concentric. Many suspension designs run into problems when the back brake is applied, which can cause issues—especially on downhill and gravity-centred bikes where the rear brake is often used. A split pivot design allows the brake caliper to be mounted to the seatstay rather than the chainstay - which means that the suspension can provide greater performance and traction, even when the rear brakes are applied.

High Pivot

High-pivot suspension is one of the most complex types but one of the easiest to spot due to the presence of an idler pulley close to the main pivot. High-pivot bikes usually follow the design of single-pivot suspension.

The higher placement of the pivot is intended to help the bike's rear wheel absorb big hits better, so it’s no surprise that this suspension design is most commonly found on gravity-centred bikes. The pulley's presence prevents pedal kickback and increases the sensitivity of this suspension design.

High Pivot suspension has been around for decades now, and you can see it in use on some truly brilliant bikes, including the Cannondale Jekyll.