Confused Between Electric Bike & Electric Scooter?

Mandy Rudd

New Member
Region
USA
Hey folks, I am planning to buy a mobility transport. The budget is around $800 to $1000 max. Confused between e-bike and e-scooter. I mainly needed it for commuting to the office, which is 3 miles from my home. Can anyone help me to explain which one I should go for and their benefits? Thanks in advance.
 
You may want to take a test ride on both at local dealers. Another factor in my experience would be what the 3 miles commute is like from your home to your office. Is it both e-bike friendly and e-scooter friendly? Are there paved bike paths nearby that permit e-bikes, but not e-scooters? How big of a factor is weather in your area? When the weather is bad, having something that goes faster might be preferable. Would one be safer than the other in your area?
 
Hey folks, I am planning to buy a mobility transport. The budget is around $800 to $1000 max. Confused between e-bike and e-scooter. I mainly needed it for commuting to the office, which is 3 miles from my home. Can anyone help me to explain which one I should go for and their benefits? Thanks in advance.
What kind of scooter do you have in mind?
 
If you have hills, I highly recommend a dual motor scooter. If you have crap roads, then you will want dual suspension, but that will increase the cost. Solid tires will be ok if the entire commute is newly paved path. Even those little lines in the sidewalk can be felt with solid tires.
To be honest, 3 miles commute while standing will get tiring.

If you choose a bike, then most 750w bikes would work. With a bike, it is very important to choose a bike that fits your body type.

Now is a good time to by with all the sales. Are you a handy person? You can save money going with a direct 2 consumer ebike. Ride1up has good bikes at a good price. Just know that with a direct 2 consumer ebike, you will eventually need repair or maintenance. Not many bike shops will work on a bike they don’t sell.
 
Three miles one way isn't very much so the scooter may be handier and quicker to just jump on and go. Depending on where you can keep it at work the scooter may be easier to store.
I have been to China and the streets are crowded with millions of electric scooters. Yes I Googled it and there are millions of them. It is probably because they don't take up as much space at home and work.
 
You may want to take a test ride on both at local dealers. Another factor in my experience would be what the 3 miles commute is like from your home to your office. Is it both e-bike friendly and e-scooter friendly? Are there paved bike paths nearby that permit e-bikes, but not e-scooters? How big of a factor is weather in your area? When the weather is bad, having something that goes faster might be preferable. Would one be safer than the other in your area?
I would definitely recommend a test ride if able

If this is what you mean by an "electric scooter" I would personally prefer an electric bike. I think it would be more versatile in the end.

1732388067704.png
 
Last edited:
If it is 3 miles each way, the pavement is good, there are no extreme hills, and the weather is not really bad, the upright e-scooter is the way to go.

1732452507596.png

I used to ride e-scooters on many of my business trips to several major European cities such as London, Berlin, Frankfurt/M, Helsinki and several other. As you can see, it was safe enough to wear white trousers!
 
I ended up with a JackRabbit OG recently. Your 3 mile commute could be done on either a ebike or escooter. I'll point out a few observations.

Escooters force you to wear a pack pack. Very few have rack options. The flip side is they are super compact. Most you cannot remove the batteries for charging.

Ebikes, such as a Lexcric XP Lite or a Ride1Up Portola, can have racks added. Also, you can remove the battery for off bike charging. Take up a tad more space.

I've owned both and hated the escooter (Apollo Ghost) because it was hurting my feet to stand on and was twitchy. I also owned many ebikes, favorite being a RadRunner. The JackRabbit is a cross between both. Not perfect (bit twitchy) but will do its job bumping around in a 5 mile radius. I added a basket, aftermarket lights, mirror and a bell. Grocery run ready!
 
My "short" runabout.
 

Attachments

  • 20241124_093117.jpg
    20241124_093117.jpg
    367.9 KB · Views: 18
  • 20241124_093233.jpg
    20241124_093233.jpg
    380.3 KB · Views: 18
  • 20241124_093343.jpg
    20241124_093343.jpg
    676.5 KB · Views: 17
I am looking for commuting

I am looking for a durable commuting scooter or e-bike with a decent range.

In Canada, if it doesn't have working pedals, it counts as a motorcycle legally and you need to be licensed and insured.

A lot of two wheeled electric "scooters" don't have pedals,..

Screenshot_20241125-093704_DuckDuckGo.jpg


Sometimes they come with pedals that are completely useless and are only there so it counts as a bicycle legally.
 
Back