I went with Keiser, which I pair with my Garmin watch for tracking.
But Peloton still gets some money from me since I use their $14.99/mo (edit: the app is $12.99/mo, with tax I pay $14.30) standalone app for workouts.
I have a Fitbit because all I wanted was a fitness tracker, not a fully functional smart watch, but the ability to use it for my workouts is important. But it does a decent enough job of tracking effort just based on heart rate without knowing every detail of resistance, cadence, etc.
I used to use an old iPad to watch Peloton classes, but now I have a Roku for the TV, so I run the Peloton app on the Roku so I can watch the class on the big screen.
Many of my friends went with the Peloton and swear by it. If you're fine being platform-locked for $39/mo it's a great option. The bike is quality, the classes are amazing, and the peer competition is motivating. All that wasn't for me though.
Since I use the standalone Peloton app with my Keiser, if Peloton raises their fee I can easily switch to another one.
Anyone that already likes spin classes wants one of these bikes. And compared to what you would pay to go to a live class at a spin studio the $40 a month is a drop in the bucket. The fact that both you and your spouse or roommate can use the same subscription with separate accounts further stacks the financials in Peloton's direction. The fact that you can hop on the thing whenever you want from the comfort of your home is another huge plus.
The bike won't last forever, but its not like the screen is going to "age out" at any point. And if the whole thing somehow completely dies in 3 years it will still have been a fine investment relative to the alternatives. Certainly you can ride for cheaper but nothing else comes close to the experience for the money.
It's the same thing as buying a Roku and paying for Netflix.
Seems more like buying an expensive Netflix player, which will only show photo albums from an SD card unless you subscribe to Netflix.
Or, buying a Peloton bike is more like buying a Roku to watch movies and then having to pay for a Roku subscription or it's useless because it doesn't work with Netflix.
Thank you for the overly-literal semantic quibbling, it wouldn't be HN without it.
There are features gated to the Peloton bike which gives a downside to the bring-your-own-bike route and muddies the waters somewhat. If the Peloton app supported ERG mode with full interactivity, I’d probably be willing to pay $25/mo, because it is a really high quality service.