I get that the weight pales in comparison to the rider or cargo. But a lighter bike – electric or otherwise – comes with some quality of life improvements. There’s the extra redundancy where a dead ebike is still ridable if it’s light enough or has sufficiently low rolling resistance. Then there’s transporting the bike, whether by bus, car, or just hitching a ride if the bike is dead or damaged.

My experience at university – where an ebike would have been phenomenally useful back then – involved hauling my acoustic bike up two flights of stairs daily. At 15 kg, that was doable. 25 kg is starting to push things. And my current ebike at 40 kg would be infeasible unless I decide to really work on my deadlift.

But I agree that there’s a point where ebikes are Good Enough™ given the constraints of technical and economic feasibility, as well as what consumer demand looks like; all consumer products tend to do this. We’ve reached an equilibrium in the market – which isn’t bad at all as it means more bikes available to more people – but I just hope the industry continues to push the envelope to welcome even more riders.

Someone out there will have all the preconditions for a short/medium distance ebike commuter, where they can replace a car drive or waiting for three buses, down to just a single bus and a modest ebike ride to their final destination.