10 Winter Motorcycling Gloves to Keep Your Mitts Warm

There are few things worse than trying to steer your motorcycle with cold fingers. Not only is it uncomfortable and even painful, but reduced finger mobility can put you in real danger.

That’s why good winter gloves are an indispensable part of any year-end rider’s gear kit. A good pair of gloves protects your hands from both the elements and other risks.

Here are 10 winter glove options that can keep your fingers from turning into icicles.

509 Range Insulated Gloves

Now, the 509 Range Insulated Gloves aren’t exactly motorcycle gloves. They’re snowmobiling gloves, so you know they can beat the cold.

The fingers are pre-contoured for grasping the handlebar, which helps considering how thick the gloves are. A reinforced top grain goat leather palm, together with the curved fingers, ensures your grip on the grips won’t slip.

The Range gloves feature a permanent breathable waterproof Hipora membrane that keeps rain and snow out while allowing sweat to evaporate.

For the insulation, the gloves feature 400g of Thinsulate material on the top. On the bottom, however, there’s only 100g of insulation, which makes these gloves an excellent choice for heated grips. If your bike doesn’t have those, though, you may feel the chill on your palms—but that’s just an excuse to finally get those heated grips.

Since these gloves are primarily for snowmobiles, there’s no knuckle protection. Nonetheless, they’re a superb match for bikes with heated grips.

Rukka Frosto GORE-TEX Gloves

I’ll admit that I’m a bit biased with Rukka—Finnish brands are always close to my heart. But even without rose-tinted glasses, Rukka Frosto GORE-TEX gloves are a good pick for cold motorcycle rides.

The palms feature a grippy leather material that’s thick enough to provide good abrasion resistance. There’s CE-rated armor on the knuckles and wrist to protect your hands from impact.

With the long double cuff, it’s easy to wrap the gloves tightly over your jacket or underlayer sleeves. Combined with the breathable, water- and windproof GORE-TEX membrane and good insulation, the gloves keep your hands warm and comfortable.

There’s even a visor wiper on the left index finger—a handy companion for fall and winter rides.

Just make sure your hands are completely dry before trying to don the gloves because the inner liner has a bad habit of sticking to wet skin and scrunching up. Once you finally get the gloves on, though, they will keep your mitts warm throughout the ride.

REV’IT! Cassini H2O Gloves

It doesn’t have to be freezing cold for your hands to get uncomfortable while riding—mere chilly weather is enough. REV’IT! Cassini H2O is a solid pick for gloves when it’s cold, but not too cold.

That’s not to say the gloves lack protection. The Cassini H2O handpieces feature 3M Thinsulate insulation and a fleece liner to keep the elements off your hands.

A Hydratex liner provides waterproofing and breathability. The palm is made is abrasion-resistant goatskin leather, which combines with hard TPU knuckle shells and palm sliders to provide impact protection.

These gloves are surprisingly lightweight and flexible (thanks to the elastic wrist). That makes them quite comfortable right out of the box—and especially after break-in.

The fit is a bit on the smaller side, so you may want to upsize by one. These gloves aren’t made for the coldest weather, but in 40 degrees, the REV’IT Cassini H2O does a commendable job of warming your hands.

Klim Togwotee Gloves

Klim is famous for quality motorcycling gear and the company’s Togwotee gloves are no exception. Although they’re primarily intended for snowmobiles (like the Rukka ones), they keep your mitts admirably toasty.

The big thing here is the removable fleece liner, which makes the Togwotee gloves very versatile. Without the liner, they work as waterproof overgloves in fall rain, thanks to the bonded GORE-TEX membrane.

Put the liner in and the gloves are good to go even in sub-freezing temperatures. With a leather palm and silicone grippers on the fingers, you’re sure to maintain a firm grip on a frosty handlebar.

As with Rukka, there’s no real armor, but the Togwotee gloves do feature silicone padding on the knuckles. The glove cuffs are easy to tighten with a quick-pull adjuster and they come with a visor squeegee built in.

The sizing is a bit wonky, so you might want to get one size larger gloves than what you usually wear. Apart from that, though, these are Klim gloves so you know you’ll get quality.

REV’IT! Stratos 2 GTX Gloves

If you’re looking to strike a balance between warmth and protection, REV’IT! Stratos 2 GTX gloves will do it for you. These warm gloves boast good insulation and respectable protection.

Thinsulate G insulation, combined with a tri-fleece liner, blocks the biting breeze effectively in all but the most Arctic of conditions. Stratos 2 GTX also uses a GORE-TEX membrane, providing improved waterproofing and breathability when compared to REV’IT!’s Cassini gloves.

For protection, you’ll find Seesoft 3D-formed knuckle protectors on the top of the gloves. EVA foam and aramid fibers on the goatskin palm offer further protection and abrasion resistance in case of sliding.

Despite the strong leather and ample protection, the Stratos 2 GTX is comfortable to wear. The gloves are a bit thick, of course, but the leather is surprisingly soft and flexible. The palm has no chafing seams either, so you can grab the grips without discomfort.

Now, these gloves are marketed as winter gloves, but I’d really call them three-season gloves. They’re warm, but not quite warm enough when the temps drop close to the freezing point.

In appropriate weather, though, your hands will stay warm and well protected.

Arctiva Thermolite Glove Liners

Already got a pair of riding gloves you love but wish they had a bit of extra warming oomph? Arctiva’s Thermolite glove liners might just be what you need.

The Thermolite liners are made out of a thin, lightweight fabric. They have a slim profile and will slip comfortably into surprisingly tight gloves to provide an extra insulation layer.

As a nice touch, the cuff is a bit longer and sticks out from many summer gloves. You can easily tuck it into a sleeve to give some wind protection for your wrists as well.

I would advise you to temper your expectations, though. These liners will not magically transform your summer gloves into winter gauntlets, nor are they meant to.

The Arctive Thermolite liners are intended to take the bite out of the breeze when fall temperatures start getting a bit too chilly for just your summer handwear or to add some additional warmth to underperforming winter gloves. And that job they do very well.

REV’IT! Taurus GTX Gloves

REV’IT! returns once more to this list and this time the company has brought out the big guns. The Taurus GTX are the brand’s flagship winter gloves.

The GORE-TEX membrane combines with the goatskin, synthetic leather, and Cordura outer shell to provide some impressive weather resistance. These gloves should keep your hands dry, no matter what kind of gale or torrential downpour you’re riding through.

On the inside, there’s a comfortable fleece liner and PrimaLoft Gold insulation. Together with the dual cuff design, you can effectively trap every bit of heat in the gloves. The pair is easy to fasten with a single motion, thanks to the combined Velcro/pull-string closure system.

Unlike the impressively warm Klim and Rukka gloves, the Taurus GTX is a dedicated motorcycling glove, so they also boast strong protection features. The knuckles and palms have a hard shell on them and the fingers are also reinforced for extra safety.

Admittedly, these are really bulky gloves. The pull string can also be a bit tight to squeeze through if you have more girthy hands (although it was no issue for my skeletal grabbers). If it's warmth you’re after, though, the Taurus GTX serves that up in spades.

Alpinestars Boulder GORE-TEX Gloves

Alpinestars is a renowned motocross gear manufacturer for a reason. Its Boulder GORE-TEX gloves continue in this vein, being rough-and-tough riding gloves for winter weather.

The insulation doesn’t pale in comparison to other gloves. Alpinestars has packed 133g of PrimaLoft Gold insulation into the gloves for excellent heat retention. While the insulation locks heat in, the GORE-TEX membrane effectively keeps water out and allows perspiration to dissipate.

To protect your hands, the gloves feature an overinjected knuckle protector. On the sides, you’ll find aramid fiber reinforcement for additional abrasion resistance and durability. A finger bridge keeps your fingers from separating in case you take a tumble.

I liked the closure strap on the wrist, which—together with a decently long cuff—made it easy to fasten the gloves.

With the insulation and protection, there’s a definite bulk to the gloves. Mitigating some it is a softshell back construction and palm stretch inserts, which aim to provide more freedom of movement.

Yet, the amount of insulation does make these gloves fairly stiff. The palms could also use some silicone bits for grip as they are fairly slippery.

Those gripes aside, the Boulder GORE-TEX gloves are made to last. And that is what they will do.

Held Overgloves

Alright, so you have an otherwise toasty pair of gloves for cold-weather riding but they let the rain seep through. Worry not—Held overglove to the rescue!

These mitts are designed to pull over virtually any motorcycling glove for additional waterproofing. The big overglove has 100% nylon construction, so it certainly won’t let a drop through.

The cuff has an elastic strap to form a seal against the sleeve of your riding jacket. I did find myself wishing you could manually tighten it, but the elastic worked well enough.

There’s no additional insulation or lining in the overgloves, so they won’t do much against the cold on their own. Still, they’re well worth adding to your pannier or tank bag for a rainy, cold day.

Klim Radiate Gauntlet Gloves

The Klim Radiate Gauntlet gloves go toe to toe with 509, Rukka, and Klim’s own Togwotee in terms of providing warmth for winter. Like the other ones, these gloves are designed for snowmobiles, but they certainly suit motorcycles as well.

The backs of the gloves are packed with 300g of Thinsulate insulation to prevent the breeze from biting through to your knuckles. As with the 509, the insulation on the palm side is thinner (100g) to allow you to still enjoy your heated grips.

Speaking of the palm, the goat leather material is nice and grippy and the interior insulation is pre-compressed. Despite their bulk, the Radiate gloves still let you grab the handlebar tightly.

A handy pull tab makes it easier to don the gloves and a combo of elastic and a pull string effectively fastens the long cuff. As a nice touch, there’s also an eject tab for quickly unfastening the gloves.

As with the snowmobile-oriented gloves, my only gripe is the lack of hard-shell protection. The cushy gloves, combined with the tough leather construction, do offer decent abrasion resistance, though—and addition to plenty of warmth, of course.