Last Updated on August 5, 2026 by Nadia Halfway
📜 Introduction.
Sometimes the best way to explore a city is not by walking 20 km a day, but by renting a bike or a scooter and weaving through streets a car could never reach.
Bikes and scooters are perfect for those journeys that aren’t accessible by car and would take too long on foot. For instance, getting through pedestrian zones, exploring a neighbourhood or a park, or simply enjoying the wind in your face on a sunny afternoon. They usually cost less than a classic rental, are much more flexible than public transport timetables, can be left in designated areas and are also much more fun.
But with new operators popping up in every city and old ones merging, rebranding, or quietly disappearing, it is easy to end up with five half-used apps cluttering your phone. In this article, I have rounded up the best bike and scooter rental platforms for exploring a city.
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🚲 Types of Bike and Scooter Sharing.
Just like with cars, there are a few different models hiding behind the words “bike sharing”. Knowing which app does what will save you time of standing on the pavement, staring confusedly at your phone.
First of all, it is important to distinguish between free-floating platforms, like Lime, Dott, or Bolt that let you pick up and drop off a vehicle almost anywhere within the operating zone. They are perfect for one-way trips and pure spontaneity.
Hub-based platforms, like Donkey Republic, work with fixed (often virtual) pick-up and drop-off points scattered around the city, which trades a little flexibility for the reassurance of always knowing roughly where to find or leave your ride.
And then there are marketplaces, like BikesBooking, where you are not borrowing a shared fleet at all, but booking a specific bike, scooter, or motorbike directly from a local shop or owner, ideal for longer rentals or destinations where app-based sharing simply does not exist yet.
📍 Lime
Lime is probably the closest thing to a global standard in this space. With its bright green e-scooters and e-bikes parked on pretty much every other street corner, it operates in over 280 cities across more than 30 countries, from the US and Canada to most of Western Europe, Australia, and beyond.
The app is really easy to use. Once you’ve registered and linked your payment method, find the nearest scooter or bike on the map, scan the QR code to unlock it, and off you go. You can pay per ride or buy a bundle of minutes for a discount, which makes it genuinely cheap for short hops.
🎁 Subscribe via Lime to unlock your €5 discount 🎁
📍 FreeNow
You might already have FreeNow installed on your phone after reading my post about the best taxi apps. If not, you should know that in several Italian cities it also works very well as an app for hiring scooters and bikes.
Rather than running its own fleet, FreeNow bundles together scooters from Voi, TIER, and Dott, and bikes from Dott, TIER, Cooltra, and RideMovi, all inside the same map, so you are not stuck comparing separate apps to find the nearest ride. At the time of writing it covers scooters in Rome, Turin, Catania, Modena, Palermo, and Reggio Emilia, and e-bikes in Rome, Turin, and Milan.
The whole process (unlocking, using and ending the ride) is done with a single tap. Every ride is covered by the provider’s insurance, which is reassuring if you’ve never ridden a scooter before.
🎁 Use the promo code below or sign up here on FreeNow to get 25% off (up to €5) your first ride (T&Cs apply) 🎁
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📍 BikesBooking
If you have ever wished there was an Airbnb for scooters and motorbikes, BikesBooking is exactly that.
Rather than a sharing app for quick city hops, this is a marketplace connecting you with local rental shops and individual owners in over 70 countries. It covers everything from a simple bicycle to a scooter, a quad bike, or even a motorcycle for a proper multi-day adventure. You browse, compare, and book online in advance, with no booking fees and verified reviews.
It is particularly useful for islands and coastal towns where a motorbike is the best way to get around. If you decide to hire a motorscooter or a motorbike, you will need a driving licence.
📍 Dott
While FreeNow currently keeps its bike and scooter coverage to a handful of Italian cities, Dott has a much wider reach across the rest of Europe and the Middle East.
After merging with TIER in 2024, Dott now runs e-scooters and e-bikes in over 400 cities across more than 20 countries, including major hubs like Paris, London, Brussels, Milan, and Lyon.
The app follows the same pattern of the previous ones. Scan a QR code, ride within the operating zone, and park in a designated spot to end your trip.
📍 Donkey Republic
If you’d rather cycle without the usual chaos associated with free-floating bike-sharing schemes, Donkey Republic is the right choice.
It runs in more than 60 cities, heavily concentrated in North Europe, the perfect and cycle-friendly destinations. Bikes are tied to virtual hubs scattered around the city, so you always know roughly where to find one and where to leave it. Every ride includes theft insurance by default, and if you are sticking around for a few days, the day-pass and monthly membership options work out considerably cheaper than paying per single ride.
📍 Bolt
You already know Bolt for taxi, but in dozens of European cities the same app quietly doubles as one of the biggest e-scooter networks around.
It’s the same platform, so you won’t need to add another app to your phone. Coverage varies quite a bit by city: some places get scooters, bikes, or both. However, a few have phased them out entirely over safety concerns. Always check what is actually available on the map before counting on it.
💡 Travel Tips.
Before you unlock your first scooter or bike, here are a few things worth knowing.
- Check the local rules before you ride. Some cities require a minimum age, ban scooters from certain streets or squares, or insist you stay off the pavement entirely. A quick check in the app (or a glance at local signage) saves you an awkward conversation with a police officer, or a fine.
- Wear the helmet if one is provided. It is not always mandatory, but it is always a good idea, especially on a scooter you have never ridden before.
- Never ride after drinking. I don’t think this needs any explanation. Don’t put yourself or others at risk: just book a taxi instead.
- Take a photo when you park. Most apps ask for one anyway to end your rental, but it also protects you if anyone claims the vehicle was left somewhere it should not have been.
- Watch the operating zone. Free-floating scooters and bikes will often slow down or refuse to let you end your ride outside the designated area. Check the map before you go too far off the beaten path.
❓FAQ.
No, none of the platforms in this list require a driving licence, since these are pedal bikes, e-bikes, or low-speed e-scooters rather than mopeds or motorbikes. The only real requirement is usually a minimum age, often 16 or 18 depending on the city and the platform.
It depends entirely on how much you plan to use it. A single short ride is usually fine paid as you go, but if you will be hopping on and off all day, or staying for several days, a day pass or membership is more convenient.
Every platform on this list lets you report a fault directly through the app, usually pausing or ending your rental. Just make sure you do not leave a clearly broken vehicle in the middle of a pavement for someone else to trip over.
Absolutely, that is exactly what they are designed for. Free-floating platforms like Lime, Dott, or Bolt do not require any commitment beyond downloading the app and adding a card, which makes them ideal for a single afternoon of exploring.
It happens more often outside major European and North American cities. In that case, BikesBooking is your best bet, since it connects you with local rental shops and private owners almost anywhere in the world.
If even BikeBooking can’t find you anything, try searching on Google for the nearest bike hire.
🎈 Conclusion.
Bikes and scooters are one of the most underrated ways to explore a city. They are cheap, they are fast, and they force you to actually look around instead of staring at a phone screen while walking.
Whether you end up zipping around on a Lime scooter, pedalling a Donkey Republic bike along a canal, or booking a proper motorbike through BikesBooking for a few days on an island, there is a platform on this list that fits your needs.
If you would rather stick to four wheels, don’t forget to check out my related articles on the best car sharing app and car rental platforms for your next road trip.
💬 And you? Have you ever explored a city by bike or scooter? If so, do you know of any other apps or platforms we could add to this list? Let me know in the comments so we can update this post.
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