Buying guide · 14 min
How to choose an electric bike
The decisions that actually determine whether you will enjoy the bike, in the order worth making them — now applied to twenty-two bikes from four brands rather than three from one.
Buying guides
The things a spec table cannot tell you
Nine guides, roughly 35,000 words, written around the questions people actually arrive with. Every figure in them traces back to a merchant’s published claim, and every estimate shows its arithmetic.
The short version
- Decide what the bike is for before you look at a single specification — the answer eliminates most of the catalogue in one move.
- Then take the specifications in this order: sensor type, torque, brakes, certification, watt-hours. The first four separate these twenty-two bikes; the fifth is a floor test you either clear or you do not.
- Sixteen of the twenty-two publish a torque figure and thirteen publish a sensor type. AMYET publishes neither for any of its five models, and the ten newest listings across the other three brands are markedly thinner than the twelve they joined.
- Convert your longest regular ride into watt-hours — miles × 25Wh, plus 20% reserve. Below about $1,200 that number is cheap to satisfy; above it you are paying for everything except energy.
- Measure your storage, your doorway and your stairs first. Eleven of the twenty-two publish a bike weight, and those run from 39 lb to 110 lb. AMYET publishes none at all.
- Look for UL 2849 on the complete bike rather than UL 2271 on the pack alone. Of the twenty-two bikes we cover, seven state both: all six Velotrics, and the VTUVIA SF20H, which is the only bike outside that range to do so.
All nine
Every guide
13 min read
E-bike motor wattage explained
Rated, peak, nominal and "3000W". What each number means, which one predicts how a bike climbs, and which is marketing.
14 min read
E-bike battery and range
Volts times amp-hours gives watt-hours, and watt-hours is the only battery number worth comparing across brands.
12 min read
Why claimed range is never the range you get
Manufacturers are mostly not lying about 220 miles. They are describing conditions you will never ride in — and in one case describing arithmetic that does not work at all.
12 min read
20-inch vs 26-inch e-bike wheels
Wheel diameter changes acceleration, comfort, storage and how the bike feels at 25 MPH. With five diameters on this site and one bike running two of them at once, it is a bigger decision than it looks.
13 min read
Single vs dual motor e-bikes
A second motor buys traction and costs range, weight and money. A mid-drive buys torque instead, and gearing multiplies it. Neither is the default answer.
13 min read
The fat tire e-bike guide
Four-inch tires solve real problems and create new ones. Twelve of the twenty-two bikes we cover have them, nine do not, one does not say, and the nine are instructive.
12 min read
Choosing an e-bike for hills
Gradient is where cheap e-bikes fall apart. Torque, gearing, cooling and brakes matter more than headline watts — and sixteen of the twenty-two bikes we cover publish the number that settles it.
12 min read
E-bikes for heavier riders
Payload ratings, frame material, brake capacity and spoke count — the specifications that stop mattering in theory and start mattering in practice. Fifteen of the twenty-two bikes here publish a payload figure. Seven do not.