My favorite thing about my Ultegra 1x12 is I have “6 OEM buttons” I can assign to do whatever I want. My 52 x 11-30 is perfect for me!
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Just one last comment before I bow out: I think what some are conflating are the statements “There is a clear trend for dropbar bikes going 1x.” and “1x is right and should be the preferred solution for everyone in all circumstances.”/“You should prefer 1x, too, because I do!” I was only arguing the former.
There are trends I don’t like (e. g. the move from pressfit to T47), and I think I can give arguments why I think it is wrong. But I still admit that this move is happening for the majority of the bike industry.
In a recent interview with Gerard Vroomen and Andy Kessler, they said that on gravel and groad bikes 80 % of the sales are 1x, for instance. Seems like we are beyond the tipping point in the gravel market. And manufacturers have started offering 1x configurations for their endurance (g)road bikes like BMC’s Roadmachine.
Yup. When SRAM started offering 1x, they had 11-speed drivetrains. There, you really had to compromise to get e. g. 420 % range, that was MTB gearing, period. The 13-speed 10–46 first 11 gears are functionally identical to a Shimano 11–32 11-speed road cassette. That’s quite a different proposition.
Like others have said, SRAM should offer more XPLR gearing option, e. g. merging them with their MTB gearing (their RDs are modular now, so maybe you’d need to change the rear cage in case that’s necessary). Or, alternatively, offer 10–40 and 13-speed 10–36 cassettes in addition to the 10–46.
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No way people in any mountainous area will buy 1x.
What is far more likely to happen (because it would actually help consumers) is more customizability when buying your bike, i.e., you will be able to choose 1x or 2x when buying your bike, hopefully along with crank length and handlebar width and stem length and maybe some other stuff.
But claiming there will only be 1x road bikes in the future is laughable.
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Adding a couple more cents to the subject of terrain vs jumps between gears, there’s a 15 km stretch of very lumpy highway about 30km south of Hobart, Tasmania, where I used to live: Channel Hwy between Kettering & Gordon if anyone wants to look closer at the example. Loads of very short, steep ascents followed by short, steep descents, with no flat road in between, rinse & repeat. The last time I cycled that way I was on the fool’s errand of trying to keep power & cadence within zones, & I was basically yo-yo-ing from one end of the cassette to the other & back again, with a few chainring changes. Using a road cassette was very fiddly, & in this edge case a wide ratio cassette on 1× with bigger jumps but the same range as my 3× would’ve been welcome. I say this as an avid multi-chainring afficionado. 
So yes, there are situations where bigger jumps between gears can be beneficial in their own right, not because it’s a side-effect getting the same range from a 1×.
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I like to think I’ve got a pretty unbiased view of 1x vs 2x, but totally disagree with this take. For me, the hillier it is, the more 1x makes sense. Maybe I’m just not up to speed on what the latest 2x options are, but the setups coming on new bikes seem to be around 1:1. And I guess I do have a bit of a bias with my 1x perspective because I’m a fan of running 10-52 in the back and don’t really understand why people run the smaller cassettes for hilly stuff. For me, running a 10-52 with a 44 or 46 chainring is a pretty good setup for hitting the mountains. Certainly a lot better than the 2x setup on my road bike (52/36 and 11-32).
When I dented my Allez Sprint I turned my Focus Mares CX into my road bike to finish out the crit season a few years ago. Tossed a 50t up front with 11-36 in the rear. Ideal? Not really but did the trick.
I also live in Breck (9,600’) Just pick and choose which routes/training I did with that setup. If I was going out for a larger ride, I’d swap out the 50 and put the 40t back on, swap chains etc. But I think I only did that once and that was closer to cross. An easy 20 miler would still have 2K of climbing but the percent was pretty mellow. The hardest part was actually the climb back up to my house (10k) when ending my rides as the grade was the steepest ha.
Kinda regret selling that bike now that I look back at it. I now have an NS1 2x and my gravel rig is also 2x. Was going to convert to 1x but been waiting on a new Revolt. Would have no issue with a 1x gravel setup where I live.
I have 50/34 & 11-34. I am in 50-11 and 34-34 quite a lot. Do I need anything lower than 34-34? Possibly on some steep sections I would use it if available, but 34-34 works, I do low cadence training, plus I could just get a 36 if I really wanted. So there is not much benefit to 46-52 but definitely a lot of drawback of the 10-52 cassette overall. Every single gear it has I have on my setup, except your 4.6 I have 4.5 and your 0.9 I have 1.0. Every other gear, at least to one decimal rounded, exists. But then there are plenty of additional gears to make jumps smaller (e.g. yea I would get a 0.88 gear, but I’d lose the 1.0 gear and in some instances that may just be the right one, so the benefit of having 0.88 for very steep sections is outdone by losing 1.0 in steep but not quite so steep sections so you either have to spin more which also isn’t nice, or be in 46-42 which may be too high).
Then, people have already confirmed in this thread that this 1x setup works well if you are in the middle of the cassette. But you’ll be on either end in the mountains, large cogs going up and small going down. Also, the 10 at the low end just isn’t as efficient anyway as the 11 to add to lower efficiency of the 1x at the ends of the cassette. So the main reason for going 1x (supposedly), efficiency, is actually worse.
Weight, sure you lose the front derailleur and one chainring but you get 52 and 42 at the back, so overall that should be close.
For me, the hillier it is, the more 1x makes sense
Just going back to this, why? You can always also just slap on a bigger cassette in a 2x. Because that literally seems to be your point. People in 2x have small cassettes because they think ‘well I have 2x’ and in 1x you are almost forced to have a big cassette, but in practice nothing stops any 2x from having a larger cassette. Maybe that is misunderstanding you, but to me it is what it reads like. Latest setups are 1:1 (I wish, I always see a 28, 30 or max 32 at the back) and you’re a fan of 52 at the back. But nothing stops anyone from changing the stock cassette to something bigger and then the whole 1x having a lower gear argument falls apart.
ps is everyone here arguing for 1x on SRAM? Maybe I’d be for it if my front shifting sucked.
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But you get more range in some 1x drive train. The guys running a mtb cassette get more range than road. The top end of a 2x (sram) is 4.8 (Normal chainrings) with a bottom end of up to a 0.9722222. Sram MTB cassette gives you a Top end of 5.0 with a bottom end of 0.961538… So if range is your goal, 1x simply out dose 2x.
The reason most 1x is Sram, is because Sram is the only one out of the two that offers competitive range’s for gearing. A 50t Chainring with a 10-36t cassette gives me top end of a race bike while still being able to crawl up hills (Kinda). Shimano cant do that unless you do an MTB cassette. A 11-34 with a 50 is just less range both ways.
No, you don’t.
Nothing stops you from putting a bigger cassette on a 2x. You are comparing hypothetical 1x setups with standard 2x setups. In fact it is absolutely bizarre anyone would think a 1x will allow more range than a setup that has both a lower and higher front ring than that 1x. And then your example is 50-36 as the lowest gear, which would be completely unusable in the mountains for normal people.
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SRAM
1x: 50 x 10-52 = 5.0 top end and 0.9615 low end
2x: 48/35 x 10-36 = 4.8 top end and 0.9722 low end
Shimano:
53/39 x 11-34 = 4.81 top end
50/34 x 11-34 = 1.0 low end
range is greater with SRAM either with 1x or 2x. If you want to run a 50t aero chainring coupled with a 10-52 MTB casette on the road bike is another matter. But technically @SUZ18 is correct - the best kind of correct.
crawling at 6mph at
34x34 = 75rpm (shimano 50/34 with 11-34)
35x36 = 77rpm (sram 48/35 with 10-36)
50x52 = 78rpm (sram 1x 50 with 10-52)
so you can ask yourself if that really matters or if it’s even discernible
Again, why are you comparing a 10-52 cassette to an 11-34 and 10-36?
So your point is valid? ‘If you put a massively bigger cassette on, your range will be higher’. Who would have thought?
Also, I have already compared the gears above in this particular setup myself, so why are you repeating it? I then have also pointed out that the reason for 1x, efficiency, is lost if you are always at the ends of the cassette, because that efficiency is for the middle of the cassette. And that you have bigger jumps in between. Honestly, why did you bother writing at all?
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I’m comparing the 10-52 to a 2x with 11-34 and 10-36 because it underlines the point made above that 1x can theoretically have more range than 2x. You can now argue that 2x can theoretically take a bigger casette than recommended by the manufacturer and now 2x has more range. Where are we going with this conversation? Every solution comes with its own caveats and in the end you choose 2x or 1x and live with the upsides and downsides. I don’t see the point in continuing the 1 By for road convo. There is no clear “winner” in my opinion - just preferences
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But you are comparing apples to oranges.
And the point wasn’t that theoretically it can, but that it does. No one until you now came up with “in theory”.
For me it isn’t about winner, it’s about choice and I stated that above. If you want 1x I hope in the future bikes will be sold so customizable that you can choose your exact setup.
But I commented on this thread because the claim was made that in some years we will all be 1x like we are all on disc now. And that isn’t the case. Then it moved on to my comment about people in mountainous areas not buying 1x. And no one has even remotely refuted any of the arguments I made there. And then you come here and suddenly make it about theoretical comparisons, that again, is nothing but comparing apples to oranges. Like do you really think I (and anyone else for that matter) is too dumb to understand that putting a huge cassette on a 1x will result in a wider range than your bog standard 2x?
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I’ve seen a lot of claims about claims in this thread, that don’t exist 
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This is one of the reasons I’ve built mine and my partners do-it-all road bikes on 1x, as the official 2x numbers don’t go as low. I’m not against ignoring specification, it’s also about the other benefits.
Incidently, we’re lucky enough to be going to two different Alps this year.. and the 1x bike is going on the trip where lower gearing is more important (among other reasons).
read back what was said in this context below:
I wrote in theory because I personally don’t know anyone that actually rides a 50t aero chainring with an 10-52 MTB casette. Maybe that’s a bit lost in translation - English is my third language.
So while this configuration would in theory work, in practice I haven’t seen it because of the obvious downsides in efficiency and/or gear jumps. I’m sure if you watch enough bikecheck videos on yt you’ll see some pros running 48 or 50 10-46 XPLR for unbound and similar events.
You argue the point that you can just put on a bigger casette on your 2x. Isn’t that “in theory” as well or what other casette do you want to run? In theory SRAM XPLR casette 10-44 with a 2x config works. I’ve seen Shimano 2x with a 11-42 working but that isn’t practical for most people as you have to “hack” some components together.
Ignorance is bliss. You can just calculate this. 1x SRAM is 520%, 1x Shimano is 510%, 2x SRAM (48/35) is 493% and 2x Shimano (50/34) is 481%.
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here is your specific 1x setup:
Does the off the shelf Shimano/SRAM 2x drivetrain work with a bigger casette than intended by the manufacturer? No, you’d need a longer cage or a different derailleur. So I don’t know who is comparing apples to oranges when you are the one arguing hacked together setups and I’m comparing off the shelfs combinations.
I don’t know why my comments ruffled your feathers - I nevery attacked you personally so I don’t understand what problem you have with me? Attack the idea not the person. In the end we’re arguing about semantics. Everything has been said in this thread about 1x or 2x. It’s friday - have a happy weekend.
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Yeah, you’ll see plenty of pros running a 50 ring with 10-52 as well. Even Keegan has run that setup in the past. They are mostly on 10-46 with the new 13 speed, but prior to that being released 10-52 cassettes were often the gearing of choice for pros in gravel races.
And I ride a 10-52 for almost all my road riding. Again, more range than what I get with 2x. And the gear jumps don’t bother me. It wouldn’t be my choice for road racing, but for training and fast group rides, it’s totally fine.
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I won’t get into the argument of gearing. Just adding my preference for 2x on road. The ranges between 1x and 2x are very close. Close enough that I’d never know the difference. For me, it’s those extra 2 or 3 gears you get with 2x to make the gear jumps smaller that is the defining feature. Yea, I have 10-51t on my MTB that has a huge range. I hate it. And that’s not even pedaling downhills. The jumps are massive. I just don’t see any benefit to 1x. It’s less efficient, less comfortable. Yea it’s simpler. But is shifting a FD really that complex? The only time I would ever consider 1x for road is if I lived in a pan flat area where I’m never shifting my FD anyways. Somewhere where I could run like a 54t up front and 11-30t in the back, which is my current crit setup.
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