In recent years, we have seen a strange explosion of inner tube options, with multiple iterations of butyl, latex and now polyurethane materials claiming to provide tangible performance advantages. British Airways Aerocoach has just released the latest round of rolling resistance tests. Although some recent options have performed well, high-end latex is still among the best.

Polyurethane is hardly a brand new inner tube material (Panaracer first introduced the Greenlite inner tube as early as the 1990s), but the reformulated polymer version has once again become the preferred alternative material. Tubolito can be said to have started this trend with its unique orange color, but the German company Revoloop has become more and more popular, and Schwalbe has recently entered the polyurethane field with its Aerothan series.

Proponents of polyurethane touted many benefits, including extremely light weight, excellent air retention, and impressive puncture resistance. For example, Tubolito’s special road model for disc brakes is said to weigh an incredible 23 grams, and Schwalbe claims that its Aerothan tube is twice as difficult to puncture as latex or butyl rubber and is more resistant to extrusion.

But what about rolling resistance?

Aerocoach’s early tests included two Tubolito inner tube models, which resulted in moderate packaging results compared to ultra-light butyl rubber and latex. Compared with the best-performing Continental Supersonic, a pair of Tubolito standard inner tubes require 2.7 watts more power to maintain a speed of 45 km/h in the company's roller test. The thinner-walled Tubolito S model is 1.5 W faster than the best-performing latex inner tube, but still 3.4 W slower.

However, there is obviously something to be said about the way the tubes are made, not just what they are made of.

The Revoloop tube is a little better and has an advantage of 2.3 watts than the Tubolito S tube, but only 1.1 watts behind the best Vredestein latex tube in the test. And those new Schwalbe Aerothans? They are located between Tubolito S and Revoloop tubes, but still have an impressive efficiency, Revoloops has the smallest 0.5-W advantage.

Strictly according to Aerocoach's data, it is obvious that if you pay great attention to reducing rolling resistance and still like to use inner tubes, then a high-quality latex inner tube is your best choice. According to Aerocoach’s test, it doesn’t seem to matter which latex tube you run. Challenge, Victoria and Vredstein models are all landing within 0.1 W (Michelin’s Aircomp latex is an outlier and requires an additional 1.4 W at the test speed, but Still ahead of all butyl and polyurethane samples, except Revoloops).

However, there are other factors to consider.

For example, if you are a stubborn heavyweight and want to reduce every bit of weight, those Tubolito S inner tubes can be reduced by 100 grams compared to latex. Polyurethane tubes also provide better air retention than latex and need to be filled up almost every day. If you obtain manufacturer data at surface value, these beautiful new polyurethane tubes are unlikely to be pierced during riding.

In other words, compared to latex, the rolling resistance is lower, and polyurethane tubing seems to have many advantages, despite the large initial investment. The retail price of most polyurethane tubing is about twice that of latex tubing (even more expensive than ultra-light butyl tubing). Fortunately, if you get an apartment, they can be repaired, although they do require a special repair kit to be repaired properly.

So which pipe is right for you? Butyl is clearly still the cheapest, while latex is still the fastest. But polyurethane is clearly making progress, and if prices start to fall, we may face a legal battle.

Which type of tube do you like and why? Please let us know in the comments below.