Electric mountain bikes are both a godsend and a curse if you like riding on trails. There’s an old saying that you have to “earn your turns”—that the dopamine-boosting swerves and leaps down a pump track just don’t feel as good if you aren’t shaky-legged and sweating from pedaling all the way up to the top. That is a lie. It feels wonderful either way. (Just follow the cries of rapidly descending “whoo-hoo!” downhill.)
Sneering at e-MTBs keeps a lot of people from the sport who aren't in the best physical shape, including former MTBers who may have gotten older or injured. Gatekeeping is never a good look. On the other hand, getting buzzed by a ton of e-mopeds in the shape of bikes on a backwoods trail is enough to make anyone murderous.
Testing electric mountain bikes is one of my favorite things to do. That’s why I've collected some of our favorite rides to help get you outside and moving. Every electric mountain bike here has been personally tested on over 50 miles of trails. Don’t see anything you like? Check out WIRED's outdoor guides, including the guides to the Best Electric Bikes, the Best Merino Wool Clothes, and the Best Gravel Running Shoes.
Jump ToAccordionItemContainerButtonLargeChevron- Best Overall
- Runner-Up
- Best Cheap Bike
- Best Gravel Bike
- Honorable Mentions
- What to Look for in an Electric Mountain Bike
- What We're Testing Next
Best Overall
- Photograph: Stephanie Pearson
- Photograph: Stephanie Pearson
- Photograph: Stephanie Pearson
- Photograph: Stephanie Pearson
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Specialized
S-Works Turbo Levo 4
$15,400Specialized
Reviewer Stephanie Pearson said it would take more words than there are in War and Peace (587,287) to describe how each component of Specialized's S Works Turbo Levo 4 has come together to work in silky, perfect harmony. You can customize your ride on the full-suspension carbon-fiber frame by changing the headset angle, so you can sit up or lean forward as you choose. It's a mullet, with a larger 29-inch front wheel that lets you ride downhill more aggressively. The motor has Specialized's proprietary app so you can precision-tune the settings on the 720-watt motor to make the ride feel powerful and intuitive.
Everything about this bike makes you feel like you're 24 years old again and you don't go “oof” every time you stand up. Pearson tested it on over 50 miles of single-track, pump track, and chunky technical rock bridges around her home in Duluth, Minnesota, using the powerful motor to sneak up behind other MTBers on inclines like The Puker to squeeze in even more downhill flow. On one ride, she was able to climb 3,451 feet over 22 miles in about 2 hours without her legs falling off. It can also switch between a Class I and a Class III electric bike, which begs the question: If you could switch to the highest assistance possible, why would you go lower?
SpecsMotor and batterySpecialized 3.1 720-watt, 840-Wh batterySuspensionFox Float with Specialized Genie shock tech 180-mm front fork, 150-mm travel rear forkBrakesSRAM Maven Ultimate four-piston caliper front and rearDrivetrainSRAM XX Eagle TransmissionRunner-Up
Photograph: Stephanie PearsonSave to wishlistSave to wishlistTrek
Slash+ 9.7 SLX/XT
$8,000 $5,200 (35% off)Trek
Specialized has its own proprietary motor system, but Trek uses one of the best new lightweight up-and-coming motors, the TQ HPR50, for its Slash+ e-MTB. It uses a pin-ring drive transmission. In most ebikes, the electric motor spins at a much faster rate than the person pedaling, and the motor compensates for this mismatch with cogs and belts. A pin-ring drive replaces these cogs and belts with one inner ring of pins, which rotates at different speeds within an outer ring of slightly different-sized pins.
This is a much lighter, quieter electric mountain bike with a smaller motor and battery; it's designed for people who want a natural-feeling ride and just a little help getting uphill. Besides the pin-ring drive (it's the quietest bike Pearson has tested), the other standard is the modified high-pivot suspension. I could write a whole separate article on different e-MTB suspensions (and I probably will), but the gist is that Trek added a separate pulley that eliminates kickback—that is, when the pedal rotates abruptly when you're not expecting it and gives you that distinctive mountain biker look, like your shins have been clawed by wild tigers. It's nimble and fast, but it's not like riding a cannon; you might want a bike with a bit more boost on your way home.
SpecsMotor and batteryTQ HPR50 250-Wh motor, TQ 580-Wh batterySuspensionFox suspension with 170 mm of travel front and rearBrakesShimano four-piston hydraulic discDrivetrainShimano XT M8100Best Cheap E-MTB
- Photograph: Stephanie Pearson
- Photograph: Stephanie Pearson
- Photograph: Stephanie Pearson
Ride1Up
TrailRush
$2,095 $1,995 (5% off)Ride1Up
What do you do if you don't have $15K to drop on a new electric mountain bike? You try an affordable one from a direct-to-consumer brand. Ride1Up promises that it offers the best quality-to-price ratio on the market, with the Ride1Up TrailRush, and Pearson agrees. It has an aluminum frame with solid, name-brand components, like a Shimano Deore 10-speed drivetrain, and some fun extras, like a dropper seat post and 29-inch tubeless-ready tires that have Schrader valves instead of Presta valves, indicating that you can even pump up these tires at the gas station.
There are a few drawbacks that come with such an affordable bike. First, it's 2 to 12 pounds heavier than any of the other bikes we tested. (e-MTBs are super fun to ride until they run out of battery and you realize you have to push them home.) The assistance is a little twitchy, which can be unnerving if you're on super technical trails; the display screen is tiny and hard to read; the frame size range is more limited compared to most other manufacturers; and because it's a direct-to-consumer bike, you might have trouble finding a bike shop that's willing to fix it. Oh! And it's a hard tail, so your old spine might not be able to take it.
SpecsMotor and batteryBrose 90-Nm with a Phylion 36-volt BN21 batterySuspensionRockShox Judy Silver TK with 120-mm suspensionBrakesTektro Orion HD-M745 quad-piston brakesDrivetrainShimano Deore SL-M6000-R Rapidfire PlusBest Gravel Bike
- Photograph: Adrienne So
- Photograph: Adrienne So
- Photograph: Adrienne So
- Photograph: Adrienne So
Salsa
Wanderosa Electric Gravel Bike
$7,999REI
$7,999Backcountry
Salsa caused a stir when it debuted the Wanderosa earlier this year. The brand calls it an electric gravel bike and it has drop bars, but it has full front and rear suspension with 120 mm in the front and 110 mm in the rear. Is it a gravel bike, or is it a drop-bar electric mountain bike? Either way, it's just a fun way to make door-to-trail riding much easier. It has a Fazua motor and battery, which are known for being extremely light and easy to use. There isn't even a display, just a tiny, almost invisible button on the handlebars. This all contributes to it weighing a remarkably little 40 pounds, for all the specs that it offers.
As a long-time gravel rider who is used to getting the teeth jolted out of her head whenever she's on trails, the Wanderosa is for gravel riders who are too old to like pain anymore. The lack of a display lends the illusion that you're still riding an analog bike, and the assistance felt remarkably natural, no matter how I toggled the shifters to get up hills on technical, muddier, rockier trails in Forest Park and the baby cyclocross track in Pier Park. The 120 mm of travel might not be that much to a downhiller, but it is plenty to reach a full 20 mph on Leif Erikson Trail, where I've been limited to slower speeds in the past by the desire to keep my shoulders in their sockets. This would be a great bikepacking bike, except Fazua does not currently offer a range extender.
SpecsMotor and batteryFazua Ride 60 450-Wh motor with a 480-Wh batterySuspensionRockShox SID Base 120-mm front fork, 110-mm back forkBrakesSRAM Apex hydraulic disc brakesTransmissionSRAM Apex Eagle 12-speedHonorable Mentions
Photograph: REISave to wishlistSave to wishlistCannondale
Moterra SL 2
$7,000 $5,500 (21% off)REI
$7,000 $5,500 (21% off)Mike's Bikes
Photograph: Will MatsudaSave to wishlistSave to wishlistSanta Cruz Bicycles
Skitch
$6,799Backcountry
$6,199Mike's Bikes
Pearson also tried the Cannondale Moterra SL 2, which is a lot of ebike power in a lightweight 45-pound package. However, the derailleur sheared off when she asked a few more aggressive riders to take it out on a single-track, which means it's probably not specced out properly. Cannondale doesn't use an e-MTB-specific derailleur, which failed under the speed and torque of an electric motor.
I tried the Santa Cruz Skitch, which is another hybrid option if you want a lightweight Fazua motor that will just give you a little kick when you're commuting home from road to trails. It's about 10 pounds lighter than the Wanderosa if you're fine with skipping the suspension.
Photograph: REISave to wishlistSave to wishlistREI Co-op Cycles
DRT e3.1 Electric Mountain Bike
$4,999 $2,499 (50% off)REI
Like all of REI's in-house gear, REI's electric mountain bike is a lot of bike for a fair price. It has quality components, a Bosch Performance Line system, and a decent-sized battery. However, 55 pounds is really heavy, even for an electric mountain bike.
What to Look For in an Electric Mountain Bike
I spoke to Sam Trachtenberg, a sales manager at Portland, Oregon's Cyclepath bike shop, about what to look for in an electric mountain bike. “Often, most of these people already have a mountain bike,” Trachtenberg says. “They're looking to get a mountain bike that either takes them further in the same time, or to go faster.”
The type of riding that you want to do affects what kind of motor and battery that you buy. Maybe you're relatively fit and you just want a lightweight bike that feels like an analog bike, with just a little boost to get you up the last, steepest part of the incline. Then you want a light motor and a little battery. The lightest motor brands right now are TQ and Fazua, and you'll probably get one with a little battery (around 400 Wh). These bikes are generally so light that it won't be a pain to bike them home once the battery runs out.
If you want a big powerful bike that goes fast, you're probably looking at a bigger battery and a bigger motor, with around 90-120 newton-meters (Nm) of torque and a 600- to 800-Wh battery. The motor brands that you're looking for here are the Bosch systems and DJI Avinox, which is the hottest full-power motor available right now. Shimano has become less popular but is still a reliable brand. Bike brands like Specialized often have their own proprietary in-house motor and battery systems.
Specialized's suspension system.
Photograph: Stephanie PearsonFinally, an electric mountain biker wants to look at suspension. If you're an aggressive downhiller, you want shocks with 160 to 180 mm of travel. “That's for when you're using the bike to get you up and then you’re going to rip,” Trachtenberg says. For more easygoing cross-country riding, suspension with around 130 to 140 mm of travel will do. You'll probably also want dual suspension—shocks for both the front and back, if your spine is too fragile to take hardtails anymore.
Bike people can, and do, spend years and days arguing about how bikes should be specced out, from frame materials to brakes and transmissions and geometry and different suspension systems. But for the purposes of electric mountain biking, there are two more specs that you should be aware of.
The first is that you need more powerful brakes to accommodate the greater speed, and possibly the heaviness, of your ebike. The second is that you want a drivetrain that can shift easily under pressure. I like the wireless tap shifters like the SRAM Apex, but then again, I'm not a very aggressive biker. Of course, the best way to figure out what kind of style of biking you like is to try some bikes and see for yourself.
What We’re Testing Next
AccordionItemContainerButtonLargeChevronMichael Venutolo-Mantovani is testing the Aventon Current ADV ($4,599), and Steph Pearson will test the Specialized Levo R ($10,800).
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