Roof Racks

Welcome to our Roof Rack page

"Roof bars" or "roof racks"? We call them roof bars.

It can be confusing when a product group is known by two different names. Car roof racks and car roof bars are really the same thing. They are the basis of any load carrying system. We prefer to use the words 'roof bars' to describe these products so you will see us refer to them over the rest of our website as roof bars.

Roof racks are the foundation of any load carrying system - everything else is fixed to them. Even cars with front to back roof rails will need a set of cross bars. It makes sense to buy a good quality system, mainly for safety reasons, but also to avoid any damage to your vehicle.

We supply roof racks from four different manufacturers – CRUZ, Atera, Thule and Whispbar by Prorack – representing the best of the mid market to the very best.

A continuum of roof bar quality

When you click on our Roof bars product finder we will show you all the roof bar options available for your vehicle.

The purpose of this page is to help you to identify your type of car roof – for example, does it have roof rails, flush mounted roof rails or Fixpoints? – and then to help you decide which brand and style of roof bars to buy.

You need to be sure about exactly which car you have. When car models change we show an overlap, e.g. Ford Focus five door (1998 to 2004), and Ford Focus five door (2004 onwards). If your car was registered in 2004, is it the last of the old model or the first of the new? If in doubt please look carefully at the pictures we provide.

You can of course mix or match brands and products, e.g. you could put a KAMEI roof box and a Thule bike carrier on Whispbar by Prorack bars, or an Atera bike carrier and a Thule kayak carrier on Thule bars.

There are essentially six very different ways of fixing roof bars to cars, as shown in the following pictures. For example, if your vehicle has “roof rails”, where you can slide your hand under the rail, then you must choose a set of bars that are “for cars with roof rails”, otherwise the bars we send you will not fit.

Product overview

CRUZ (Spain) makes much the best quality mid market bars on the market, a modular system with separate adapter kits, i.e. when you change car you often only need a new adapter kit. Atera (Germany) and Thule (Sweden) make bars of equal quality. Atera bars, which are always available in either steel or aluminium, are supplied complete; everything is in one box, all adjusted and ready to fit onto the car. Thule bars are supplied in modular form, which means several boxes of components that you fit together. You may be able to use some or most of these components when you change vehicle, but the six different roof fixing types usually require different Thule Foot Packs. Thule is the world’s largest manufacturer of roof racks. Their bars are always available in steel, sometimes in aluminium. Whispbar by Prorack S-wing bars are the new generation of roof bars, taking roof bar science a long way forward. They have an aerofoil-shaped aluminium wing that generates minimal drag and therefore makes next to no noise and has a negligible effect on fuel consumption. This is also a modular system but you use the same “foot” for all six roof fixing types, and you’ll probably only need to change adapter kit when you change vehicle.

More on the brands we sell and what makes them special:

I know what car I have, what roof fixings it has, and what brand I want. But are aluminium bars worth the extra money?

Most of the aluminium bars we sell are oval-shaped “aerobars”. They certainly look very smart and, being aluminium rather than steel, they are always the more expensive option. There are however three important practical reasons for choosing aerobars:

(1) You can use the full length of the bars for fixing your accessories, which may allow you to carry more on the roof, and thereby get better value from the whole system. Whatever you’re carrying on the roof bars is fixed to the aerobars via the slots that run full length along the tops of the bars. A frequent problem with the cheaper steel bars is that the roof bar feet get in the way of the accessory fixings.

2) Aerobars are substantially quieter than steel roof bars, as the name “aerobar” suggests. Roof bars generate a hum, sometimes a whistle, often around the ‘middle C’ frequency, which can become intrusive in certain situations, especially if the roof bars are exposed - it depends on the type of car, the type of roof bars, and the position of the roof bars on the roof. The volume tends to increase in line with speed. We don’t want to exaggerate this issue – millions of roof racks have been sold over the years, and if the roof bars sometimes make an irritating noise, so also do the tyres, the engine, and the passengers! It’s also important to note that roof rack whistle can usually be reduced to an acceptable level by moving the roof bars forwards or backwards, even by a centimetre, and that it’s much less of an issue if there's a roof box to change the airflow.

(3) Aerobars create less drag than steel roof bars and therefore have less of an effect on fuel consumption. This is important, especially if you are likely to use your roof bars frequently or to leave them in place for many weeks at a time. Aerobar science has undergone a massive and we suggest fundamental leap forward with the launch of the beautiful looking Prorack “Whispbar”; this has been shown in test conditions to create almost 70% less drag than its major competitors. It is truly a product for our times and it’s no surprise to see it winning prestigious design and environmental awards.