GUIDE: The Autonomy of an Electric Bike

The autonomy of an electric bike can vary enormously depending on the type of battery on board, but also based on different criteria such as the type of route taken or the level of assistance used. Here are the factors that directly influence the autonomy of your e-bike!

The first thing to know when we're talking about the autonomy of electric bikes is that there is no universal technique to calculate it. While with cars you can use the WLTP system (test procedure for light vehicles harmonized worldwide), each e-bike manufacturer uses its own scale, and it is not uncommon for the autonomy announced to be much more generous than the one observed in reality . On a European scale, the Austrian association VIG is trying to establish a unified test protocol to better compare the performance of the different e-bike models.

The battery is, in a sense, the reservoir of your electric bike. The greater its capacity, expressed in Wh, the better the autonomy detected. In general, the batteries of the entry-level models are around 300-400 Wh, which is sufficient to travel from 20 to 60 km depending on the conditions, while those of the high-end models can reach a capacity of 600 or 800 Wh .

The level of assistance chosen by the biker will have a direct impact on the electricity consumes and, as a consequence, on the level of autonomy of the electric bike. This is also the reason why manufacturers tend to indicate a rather wide range of autonomy, which sometimes reaches 80 km.

If you want to optimize the autonomy of your electric bike, you will have to adapt your driving style, for example by adopting the lowest assistance levels on flat ground and reserving the use of higher levels of assistance for the steepest routes.

The autonomy of your electric bike will be better or worse depending on the route taken. Climatic conditions can affect battery performance, as chemical elements can react differently depending on the outside temperature. Likewise, driving against the wind will require more effort and will tend to reduce battery runtimes.

While the weight of a driver has no impact on the car's engine, the weight of a cyclist has an important impact on the driving experience of an ebike. Why? Simply because the ratio is not the same. On a 22 kg electric bike, an 80 kilo individual will increase the overall mass by almost 25% compared to a 60 kilo person. There will therefore be inevitable consequences on autonomy.