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When getting your very first electric personal vehicle, the number of choices can seem endless. There’s an electric version of pretty much anything these days (even skateboards can be battery-powered!), so choosing which vehicle is best for you can be a time-consuming task. That’s why today we’re going to narrow it down to e bike vs e scooter.
While neither one is objectively better than the other, one will likely be better suited for you, depending on your own preferences. Let’s start breaking down the pros and cons of just e bike vs e scooter.
Here are the five main things to keep in mind if you are leaning toward buying an electric bike:
While this might be the most obvious one on the list, there aren’t many escooters that have seats. Some do, but they are uncommon, and they also tend to raise the price tag substantially. All ebikes come with padded seats making them the more comfortable choice, especially for people planning longer commutes or daily usage.
Escooters can be fun for shorter rides or anything lasting up to an hour. Anything beyond that, and you might be feeling some fatigue in your feet or legs.
Not only that, but electric bikes have larger tires and larger frames, so they inherently have better shock absorption. Keep this in mind if you live in an area with uneven or unpredictable roads or terrain.
If you want a vehicle that will go as fast as possible, then ebikes are the way to go, end of the story. They are usually outfitted with much more powerful motors that can attain higher speeds.
For reference, many e scooters can go around 15 mph, but many e-bikes can go as fast as 25 mph, and these are just averages.
Even if you want a more leisurely cruising speed, ebikes can offer that as well with gear shifting capabilities and cruise control functions that place caps on the max speed.
While they will be pricey, there are ebikes with max speeds exceeding 35 mph, truly giving you the ultimate potential of what these bikes have to offer.
Just like with motors, ebikes tend to have more powerful batteries than escooters. As a result, they have better mileage per battery charge. This makes ebikes a better choice for people who have long commutes to work or school or enjoy taking advantage of any long bike or nature trails in their area.
Everyone knows that bicycles are great for exercising, yet despite being electric, ebikes are no different. While you can use the motor and remote control for a pedal-free experience, ebikes allow you to operate them like a normal bike as well.
You can combine both manual pedaling with remote motor control to get the best of both worlds in case you don’t want a full workout. Even more useful is that ebikes will still work like a standard bike, even after the battery is depleted. The bike will be a little heavier because of the battery and the motor, but it’s not too much more weight.
This extra weight and resistance can be seen as a pro and not a con depending on your perspective. The extra difficulty only makes the exercising more efficient, after all.
Escooters are a different story. For most of them, they become inoperable once the battery is depleted. That’s because the wheels of escooters are not designed to be operated manually, though there are exceptions.
Another win for ebikes is the extra utility space that they offer. Bikes are heavier and bigger than scooters, which allows them to hold extra weight without feeling the brut of it.
More importantly, some ebikes come with included carrying baskets or cargo areas to put your belongings or groceries. If your ebike doesn’t come with one, you can easily purchase a separate basket to place on it. This makes ebikes a much better choice than escooters for grocery shopping.
Much like with ebikes, here are the things that make electric scooters the better option:
There’s no denying that e scooters take up a lot less space than e-bikes. This makes them better options for storing at home or in car trunks and even public transit.
Some escooters have a folding function which makes them even smaller and more portable. And because they’re much more lightweight than ebikes, they are easy to carry around indoors so you don’t have to worry about leaving them outside.
Some ebikes are foldable as well, but they can never reach the level of minimalism that escooters can achieve.
Arguably the biggest thing that escooters have going for them is that they tend to be much, much cheaper than ebikes.
That’s not all – escooter prices tend to be much more consistent and predictable than ebike prices.
That means that the more expensive an escooter is, the more likely it is to have better speed, mileage, and battery power. This is not necessarily the case with ebikes because sometimes the higher price simply means a more lightweight version or one with fatter tires, not necessarily a model with a faster motor.
Ebikes are typically more difficult to construct and require higher quality materials, so this is another reason why they are almost always more expensive.
This final category is the most ambiguous one, but it’s safe to say that escooters win when it comes to safety – for most circumstances.
On one hand, e bikes have thicker wheels and frames which means they are better at handling certain road hazards like bumps or holes.
On the other hand, e scooters are thinner and swifter which makes them better for turning and navigating in city environments.
If you plan on traversing off-road surfaces primarily, you will probably be better off with a fat tire e-bike. But if you’re like most people and are just looking for a fun and simple way to get to the mall or to work, an escooter will probably be a better bet.
You might be thinking that because ebikes have five things in their favor and escooters have three the debate of ebike vs e scooter has been settled once and for all. That, however, is not necessarily the case.
If you’re the type of person who really wants a new personal transportation device but is really on a budget, you might be more naturally drawn towards escooters over ebikes.
At the end of the day, you can trust your own judgment. While the pros and cons have been provided for you, it’s up to you to decide what pros matter most to you. As long as you make an educated choice, you’re guaranteed to make the correct one.
Thank you for reading and be sure to have fun with your new ebike, escooter, or both!