Cybex Priam Review by Best Buggy

The Cybex Priam is a stunning luxury pushchair with a price tag to match. There is a choice of wheels, seat and colour to personalise your Priam to suit your lifestyle. There are two seat options – the Lux seat or the 2-in-1 Light seat. The 2-in-1 Light seat converts from a carrycot into seat unit as your baby grows. The Lux seat is a framed seat with a very padded liner making it super comfy for a child.
There are three sets of wheels – All Terrain, Trekking and Light. The Light wheels are for the city – for use on smooth tarmac or paving. The All Terrain wheels are for bumpy cobbles and rougher ground. The Trekking wheels offer a compromise between the country and the city.
The chassis is available in chrome or in black.
Our Cybex Priam has a Matte Black chassis, Trekking wheels and a Lux seat unit.

First Impressions

Our first impressions of the Cybex Priam is that it is a big, tall, long pushchair. It is also large and relatively heavy to lift and carry (although not the heaviest pushchair we have had), but it can be pulled along behind you very nicely.
It is also a beautiful pushchair. It is easy to see from the finish, fabrics, chassis and wheels why the Priam bears a premium price tag. The chassis is minimalist with smooth sleek lines, which is something you tend to only see on the most premium pushchairs. The fabrics are good quality and the seat is well padded. The ‘action’ buttons all have a beautiful silver metallic finish. The Cybex Priam is absolutely top quality for your little one.

Child Comfort, Harness, Bumper Bar and Accessories

The 2-in-1 Light seat is a convertible seat. This means that in the box you receive a seat/carrycot frame along with two sets of fabrics – one for the seat unit, and one for the carrycot. You choose which set of fabrics to put onto the frame depending on if you require the carrycot or the seat unit. We are unable to comment here about the 2-in-1 Light seat, but it is great that a parent has a choice in which seat they would like to purchase.

Our Priam has the Lux seat. This is a framed seat with an adjustable calf rest. The seat is suitable from birth because it lies completely flat, however there is also a carrycot option if desired. The seat can both forward and reverse face, and also sits quite high on the chassis compared to other pushchairs. We did find the seat sits quite a long way forwards when forward facing. It is not a problem, but it was noticeable. Equally when the seat was parent facing, the child was close enough to you, whilst having room to recline the seat.

The Lux seat has 4 positions including a very upright seating position and a lie flat position. The seat reclines using a lever at the rear of the seat. I would love to say that this was easy to do, but first you need to find the lever behind what is a fairly floppy hood; and secondly it does take a firm hand to lift and move the lever. There is a hole in the hood for the lever to protrude, but our hood flops down at the rear of the seat. Even when you site the handle in the right position, it still does not sit correctly and this does look a little messy on such a luxury pushchair. We have found playing “hunt the recline handle” one of the frustrating parts of this pushchair.

The Lux seat itself is absolutely huge, although the seat measurements rather strangely do not bear this out. Master BB is nearly 6 years old in the photos above. He looks totally comfortable – just look at his crossed legs! He has lots of room still above his head. His feet rest comfortably on the footrest although he does prefer to dangle his feet (normal for him!). The upper weight limit of 17kg is generous for a pushchair. There will be plenty of room for a typical toddler or even pre-schooler.

The seat has an inbuilt liner on the upper half of the seat. This adds a very comfortable layer of padding, but this is sewn in and can not be removed on its own for washing, although the whole fabric can be removed and washed. We found this liner a little frustrating because the harness is attached behind the liner at a much higher point, approximately 9cms higher than the highest liner hole. There is no ‘give’ in the fabric to allow the liner to the pulled up to the level of the top of the harness. As our photos show, we could have made use of this additional harness height with Master BB.

The harness height is adjusted by sliding the shoulder height up and down a central piece of webbing. On the one hand this seems rather rudimentary for a luxury pushchair, however it is a quick and simple way for a parent to adjust the harness height (much easier than having holes to push the harness through), although you still have to fiddle under the harness pads to adjust. This would make it easy for siblings to share one pushchair if necessary. It also means that it is simple to ensure the child’s harness is always correctly adjusted to ensure their safety. There are harness pads and a crotch pad. These are thick and the harness pads can be opened up by undoing press stud’s to make fitting a footmuff easier. The pads have a loop at the top which can be hooked over the plastic adjustment sliders. However, these do easily fall off again, and to be honest aren’t worth even trying! The harness webbing is comfortable, silky and smooth. The harness is a 5 point one, but only two points need fitting into the wonderfully chunky buckle. These can be fitted individually, thus making it simple to buckle a child in. The harness buckle can also be removed one side at a time if necessary with a firm press on the centre button. It is important to ensure that the buckle parts do click properly together – there is a very audible click when the harness is properly buckled in. There is a large buckle pad to make this comfortable for the child.

The adjustable footrest has three positions. These are altered by pressing in a button on either side of the footrest. This is easy to do when the seat is forward facing, however it is a little tricky to do when the seat is rear facing as you have to get your arms around or through the handlebar. We also found turning / removing the seat a little tricky too. The seat doesn’t ‘pop’ off as easily as we would have liked, and its very easy to not lift the seat high enough clear of the chassis before it reattaches itself. You need wide arms and the seat is relatively heavy.

The Priam has a beautiful hand stitched leatherette bumper bar. This clicks in firmly on each side and has a lovely metal button to release it. The bumper is hinged so that the child can be lifted in and out easily. The seat is quite high, with no lower footrest, so the child would need lifting in and out.

Hood, Storage and Raincover

The hood is a 3 panel hood, with an additional central hidden zip out panel, making 4 panels in total. The rear panel is about half the size of the others. The zip out panel is solid fabric but with a plastic peekaboo window inset, so if you like to see your child, then you will need to keep this zip out section open. The zipper is lovely a chunky. As mentioned above, our hood has been very floppy at the rear and it also feels like it doesn’t quite sit straight. The hood easily detaches from the chassis, and there is only a small hole in the fabrics for you to try to fix the hood back on again. It got a little frustrating having to keep reattaching the hood with just finger tip access! The hood has UVP50+ sun protection.

The basket is unusual. It is very similar to the Joolz Day basket, but seems to work a little better. The basket is fabric and enclosed on all sides. The rear has a pull down flap. This is held in position by magnets. It is possible to leave the basket open as well without things falling out e.g. if a bag won’t fit in, or you want quick access in and out. The basket easily fitted my handbag inside, Little Miss BB’s bag in and more. We were concerned about access especially when the seat was parent facing, but Cybex have cleverly ensured that the basket will open and can be left open, when the seat is parent facing. We don’t have a carrycot, but we feel sure that access would be no problem with a carrycot in place. The front section of the basket is a thick mesh which we suspect would let in water if wet, and also allows items to be seen if you look closely. We were concerned that our cats would scratch this mesh and damage it. Equally a small child may lean on it or poke a toy through the mesh. The whole of the basket would really have been much better as solid fabric.

We had huge fun and games with the basket whilst taking photos. We stopped to do some shopping and I realised my phone had gone missing. It was on silent because I don’t like it to make a noise when taking pics in shops. Little Miss BB has a phone for her medical equipment, so I used that to telephone my phone. My Pebble watch was vibrating, so I knew the phone was still in range, so we searched the store to no avail. The Apple store was across the road, so we ran over there to track my iPhone. The tracking showed that the phone was still nearby. We went back to the first shop and said the phone must still be in the shop. We got Master BB out of the pushchair, we emptied the basket, and we still couldn’t find the phone. After a lot more searching an assistant said, your shopping basket is vibrating. We emptied the basket out again, and found a small pocket stitched inside the basket, and when I popped my phone in through the side of the closed basket, it must have slipped into the pocket!!! Easy when you know it is there as I do now, but I was a more than a little puzzled at the time! Anyway just so you know (!), there is a useful pocket to hide valuables that you don’t want to be easily found inside the basket.

Cybex include a raincover in the box. It is good quality and easy to throw on.

Handlebar, Handling, Wheels and Brake

The handlebar on the Priam is absolutely beautiful to hold and push. It is a medium to thin handlebar, but it is so comfortable. The leatherette is hand stitched and is smooth to hold. The telescopic handlebar is height adjustable from a very low position, up to a high one – higher than I need which makes it tall! To adjust the handlebar you need to slide the button on top of the handlebar, whilst squeezing in the button underneath.  The pushchair all round feels tall and proud. It really is a fine, statement of a pushchair.

The handling is absolutely superb. One of the best pushchairs we have ever pushed. The steering was light. The wheels were superbly smooth. Even with 6 year old Master BB on board, the push was effortless. The foam filled rubber wheels are puncture proof. We loved the narrowness of them, which give the Priam an elegance above all other pushchairs. The Priam is a surprisingly narrow pushchair. We managed to push the Priam straight through our indoor safety gates, which rarely happens with a bigger pushchair. The all round suspension is beautiful too – just perfect – not too hard and not too soft but plenty off it when you need it – and we have no doubt that Master BB was having a comfortable ride.

There is a central rear footbrake. This is easy to flick on and press off.

The Cybex Priam has two additional options.
First, there is a two wheel mode. This can be done very simply with the seat left on. Simply press in the two black buttons half way down the handlebar and the wheels slide really easily together. It was effortless to do, and was no problem to put the pushchair back onto four wheels again at the end. For anyone who lives by a beach or goes up and down steps, or has the requirement for a two wheel mode, then the Priam has to be the easiest pushchair to convert. It was simple to pull the Priam along in two wheel mode although you need to work hard to keep the seat upright. The seat unit needs to be parent facing. A car seat nor carrycot should be used in two wheel mode.
Due to this two wheel mode facility, there is a bit of movement in the handlebar – not as much as the Cameleon handlebar, but there is still some movement. Also, the seat unit keeps the chassis locked together, so when you remove the seat, the chassis moves easily.

The wheels are easy to pop on and off if necessary.
Secondly, skis can be fitted to the Priam for winter use. We have not tried these. These replace the front wheels, and should make light work of snow.

Carrycot and Travel System

Car seat adaptors come with the pushchair which allow the Cybex cloud Q and Aton Q infant carriers to be fitted to the chassis.
There is an optional carrycot for the Priam, or as mentioned above, the 2 in 1 seat converts into a carrycot or a seat unit.

Fold

The Priam fold is very easy, which is refreshing for what appears to be a big pushchair. The fold can also be done one handed, which is handy if you use public transport. Simply fold the handlebar down, then the chassis slides naturally together. The seat can be left on forward facing to fold, or can be removed. If left on, the seat can be folded in half to form a neater fold. The chassis does not have a fold lock, although we would have liked one to stop the pushchair splaying when carrying, and from sliding open when placed down. The Priam will freestand when folded if you allow the chassis to slightly splay into an ^ shape. The Priam fold is very neat, and it is easy to carry. We have found it simple to tow the Priam along as well.

In Conclusion

It has been difficult to score the Priam because this is a truly excellent pushchair and we LOVE it. However, the Priam is one of the most expensive pushchairs on the market (£810 for our version) and for that we expect perfection. Our feeling is that whilst the Priam really is one of the best pushchairs we have ever had the pleasure to push, and really exudes quality and style; it also has a few details which could be made better. The hood fixings, recline handle hole, and flopping hood could all be improved. The advantage of a high harness position is lost behind the liner. A removable liner would have been useful for washing. The harness pads could be held in place in a more sophisticated way.  The mesh on the basket is not practical for wet weather. A fold lock would have been good to have. Whilst a carrycot is not required from birth, it would be an additional cost which is worth bearing in mind.

Whilst we would love to give the Priam a top rating, we are going to award it a Best Buggy 4 and a half gold star rating because we think that it is not quite as perfect as it should be for the price. However, we must stress that the Priam is still one of the best pushchairs on the market, and we actually prefer it over some of the pushchairs that we have given a 5 star rating to. We would highly recommend.