Helmet Visors, Face Shields & Other Helmet Accessory Reviews

Face Shields, Helmet Visors & Other Helmet Accessories All Reviewed By Our Hands On Expert Editors

It’s hard to keep your eyes on the road or track when the sun is beating down on your face and there is glare and shadows impeding your vision. The good news is that there is a simple solution we love and have tested and thats the addition of a motorcycle helmet visor. Visors help shield your eyes from glare. As always when it comes to motorcycle gear there are many options and styles, from clear, to tinted and mirrored visors and even designs and character designs for those who really want to stand out.

Visors aren’t the only way to deal with glare and sunlight affecting your vision on the road. You can wear sunglasses or goggles under a clear visor (although this isn’t always comfortable). Flip-down sun visors are another choice, but we’re never been huge fans due to the impact it can have on crash safety. Personally, we always recommend just getting some good visors. It gives you the main benefit of solving the vision issue for your entire field of vision. The bottom line is that looking through two layers – visor and sunglasses/goggles is never going to be as easy or comfortable as looking through one.

We like to have several visor units around depending on the riding conditions. In the mornings we like to ride with a clear visor and later in the afternoons and dusk we like to have a darker visor. Swapping your visor takes 5 seconds and they are easy to store so this works well for us. Visors need to be swapped for new ones once a year or so. They get scratched and lose their clarity.

When your visor gets covered in bugs and muck there are several great cleaning products we’ve reviewed to quickly deal with that. Also, if you are dealing with cold weather and get fogged up helmets there are some great anti-fog options out there too which we cover below.

Disclosure: We make money (and keep the site running) through ads and affiliate links. That means that when you click a link to sites like RevZilla or Amazon you are supporting us because we may get a commission if you purchase. We have developed a policy that you can find here but the gist is that our reviews are 100% unbiased and we don’t take payments or allow potential commissions to dictate what we say about products. 

Best Motorcycle Helmet Visors & Face Shields

Over the years we have reviewed a lot of helmet visor related products from treatments to storage to goggles and even water repellents. In that time we’ve found our favorites and even researched products we haven’t tested personally. We created our top 10 lists with the goal of helping you quickly find great products we highly recommend.

 

Recent Reviews

We’re always reviewing new visors and visor related products so be sure to check out our most recent reviews here.

Raincoat Water Repellent Treatment Review

Your Comments and Feedback

From “E.T.” (11/09):  “First, thanks for all the reviews- the info is great and almost too much to absorb.  However I am wondering if reviewers pay much attention to the face shields on full-face helmets.

My AFD4 (Fulmer) comes with a face-shield that is designated as “not warranted shatter-proof” and has no DOT approval on there- thus runs into major trouble at New Jersey inspections.

Granted, New Jersey is one of the most anti-motorcycle states I can imagine and the DMV workers don’t know squat about bikes.

But is the face-shield the Achilles heel of helmets?

I’ve heard that some more expensive helmets, including Scorpion helmets, are also marked “not warranted shatter-proof”. If this is an issue, I think it would be a great thing to note in reviews. Thanks again for the site!”

Editor’s Reply: You’re probably right; I think most riders simply assume the face shield meets the same safety standards as the helmet shell. But as far as I know, the DOT FMVSS-218 standard does not address the visor/face shield.

Most states (36 I believe) require a face shield that meets the now very old (first developed in 1971) Vehicle Equipment Safety Standard VESC-8 (opens a .pdf file).

Most of the helmet face shields we see have a “VESC-8″ label engraved on them. Some also meet ANSI Z87.1-2003 standards for eyewear.

But most face shields are also labeled ‘Not warranted shatterproof” because it would be virtually impossible to claim that a face shield is “shatterproof” (whatever that vague term means!).

Given enough force, projectile and angle of attack, probably every face shield/visor will shatter at some point.

I have never seen a face shield with a “DOT” sticker or approval, because as far as we know, there is no such thing as a DOT standard for motorcycle helmet face shields.

Do you know exactly what the New Jersey law requires? Perhaps their documentation will provide some clues…

If anyone has further information on this, please contact us at the email address above.

Follow-up Response from “E.T.” (12/09): “New Jersey inspection standards demand an ‘approved’ face shield or goggles, but fails to identify where such approval can be found… at least DOT helmets have a stamp.

I suspect the anecdotal cases of people being rejected at inspection for that may be as a result of someone at the DMV having a pissy day.

“NJ 39:3-76.8. Goggles or face shield to be worn by motorcycle operator. No person shall operate a motorcycle unless he wears goggles or a face shield of a type approved by the director.

The director is authorized and empowered to adopt rules and regulations covering types of goggles and face shields and the specifications therefore and to establish and maintain a list of approved goggles and face shields which meet the specifications as established hereunder.”

Editor’s Response: Interesting – you’d think they’d simply go with established standards instead of testing and approving goggles and face shields independently and then publishing a list that…apparently is not published or available anyway?

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