Been riding flat pedals since I got back into mountain biking in 2014 but am thinking of trying clipless. Been using SPD-SL on the road over the last year so that helps with the mental block of unclipping to bail. Two of my good riding buddies swear by Time and after some reading/video research (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRirFQ80z4w that vid in particular) I think Time sounds like the best tradeoff of ease of clip in/out, retention and float for me. I do move my feet around on my flats a bit so I don't think I want a totally locked in feeling. I like that Time has a decent reputation for reliability vs Crank Brothers.
Anyone have thoughts on the Speciale 8 vs 12? The 12 is about $240CAD on sale, the 8 about $140 online. The 12 is marketed as beefier and it is a bit bigger, has more traction pins but not sure that's worth $100. This is for trail riding North Shore/Sea to Sky, maybe one or two bike park days a summer. On the other hand I'm not that hard on pedals, been using the same pair of Race Face Atlas flats since 2017 without even servicing them, so I don't mind paying $100 more on an item I'll use for years.
Shoes, Five Ten has always fit me well for flats so I will try to track down some Kestrel's to check the fit.