[2] The magazine is published by the Tricycle Foundation, a not-for-profit educational organization established in 1991 by Helen Tworkov, a former anthropologist and longtime student of Zen and Tibetan Buddhism, and chaired by composer Philip Glass.

The blog, Trike Daily, covers topics ranging from the history of same-sex marriage in the sangha to climate change as a moral issue.

Tricycle made a concerted effort to feature content about all the Buddhist traditions, not just those most familiar to Americans, such as Tibetan, Theravada, and Zen Buddhism.

According to Notre Dame's American Studies Chair Thomas A. Tweed, Tricycle, based on surveys, "estimated that half of the publication's sixty thousand subscribers do not describe themselves as Buddhist.

In the past year, the pages of Tricycle have considered serious topics from addiction to aging, challenged widely accepted notions of the historical Buddha, and recounted spiritual quests that have not led to Buddhism.

This openness to difficulty and uncertainty suggests a living-out of the words the magazine puts to print… After much deliberation, some back-issue rereading, and more than one impassioned speech, we're very pleased to announce Tricycle as the winner of Utne's 2013 Media Award for Body/Spirit Coverage.

Contributors have included the Dalai Lama, Peter Matthiessen, Philip Glass, Thích Nhất Hạnh, Sharon Salzberg, Jon Kabat-Zinn, Joseph Goldstein, Jack Kornfield, Curtis White, Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, Stephen Batchelor, Pema Chödrön, bell hooks, Robert Aitken, Alice Walker, Spalding Gray, Robert Thurman, Bernie Glassman, John Cage, Joanna Macy, Sulak Sivaraksa, Laurie Anderson, Guo Gu, Martin Scorsese, Pico Iyer, and Tom Robbins.

According to Sallie Dinkel from New York Magazine, “Tricycle has functioned as a kind of tugboat of awareness, pushing and pulling traditional Buddhism in a direction that will make sense for the worldly American mainstream… The magazine has published articles on abortion, euthanasia, AIDS, and the Los Angeles riots.”[14] Helen Tworkov has said she has "seen a growing acceptance of Buddhist practice throughout the country, although not without a degree of misunderstanding, like a belief among some people that the Dalai Lama is a sort of ‘Buddhist pope,’ in a tradition that lacks such an office.

[citation needed] In 1993, Tricycle created “Change Your Mind Day," an afternoon of free meditation instruction held in New York City's Central Park.

During the first Change Your Mind Day, newcomers and seasoned Buddhists meditated, listened to performances by Philip Glass and Allen Ginsberg, and did tai-ch’i.