Aventon Aventure Review

The Aventon Aventure is Aventon Bikes electric fat-tire mountain bike model. The Aventure comes equipped with Kenda fat tires and front suspension making it a comfortable, universal ride for most. The Aventure scored a 53 on our Tower ebike score giving it a mediocre ebike ranking. To learn more about the Aventon Aventure read our full review below.

DISCLAIMER - Aventon and Aventure are trademarks of Aventon Bikes, and use of that trademark in this review does not indicate that the reviewer is claiming any interest in the mark or any affiliation with or sponsorship or endorsement by Aventon Bikes.

Aventon Aventure Review

Today, we're going to be reviewing and rating the Aventure by Aventon. That's "Adventure" without the D so you spell it right. Aventon jumped on the e-bike trend a few years back. They do one of the better jobs in terms of styling and looks on eBikes. They've got a lot of different electric bike models but today, we’re reviewing the Aventure Ebike. The Aventon Aventure Ebike scored a 53 on our 100-point scale, which rates it as a mediocre electric bike.

Before we get into the score, I want to introduce myself. My name is Stephan Aarstol. I am the CEO of the Tower e-Bike Repair Shop here in San Diego. We see hundreds of e-bikes come in through our shop. Therefore, we see a lot of different electric bikes within the industry.

What we normally do is have our professional mechanics, who have ten plus years of experience in the bike world and the electric bike industry, review and rate all of these electric bikes on seven key attributes. These are as follows:

Electric Bike Materials Quality
Bicycle Mechanical Quality
Low maintenance of Electric Bike
Electric Bike Hill-climbing ability
Electric Bike Range
Electric Bike Comfort
Electric Bike Universality

Those are the seven key attributes that build up our Tower Score. In each category, the e-bike gets a score between one and ten, ten being the highest. After which, we normalize all seven scores to get a handy single-point score out of a hundred. When all is said and done, we’ll be able to provide e-bike customers and shoppers with a succinct rating that will give them all the context they need to make an educated purchase decision.

Nowadays, the e-bike market is a saturated market. It's hard to figure out if an e-bike lives up to its name without seeing and testing it for yourself. Fortunately, we run an e-bike repair shop. Thus, we’re quickly able to see all types of e-bikes and review and rate them. We offer guidance, insight, and knowledge on the different e-bikes that we find. That's the Tower Score. That's what we're doing here. It's like the wine spectator score if you're familiar with it, but for eBikes instead of wines.

There are almost as many types of electric bikes in the market as there are varieties of wine. It can be overwhelming to try to figure out which bike is going to match your needs best. Plus, it's tough with a lot of these e-bike companies being direct-to-consumers. They don't have a retail display model or an area where you can test ride their bike without paying thousands of dollars and having it shipped to you. That’s why we want to give as much information as possible and in a simple, digestible manner from a trusted source. Nobody pays us to review their eBikes, or pays us an affiliate marketing percent of their sales, which is a bit different that how many eBike sites operate online.

Apart from the Tower score, we also have a supplementary score. It's also based on 100 points and it's called the Specialty Score. The Specialty Score is a supplementary score that we like to include. It omits the last two attributes of the tower e-bikes score; namely comfort and universality. The point of the Specialty score is to take into consideration the purpose of a specific e-bike and what it was made for. In other words, we wouldn’t want to judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree.

Some bikes, like off-road bikes, are made for performance during rugged use, not made for comfort per se. Thus, it will always score low on comfort. You get the idea. It'd be a bit unfair to judge some bikes on comfort and universality when it wasn’t even made for those. Comfort and universality may not be the focal point of the product we’re reviewing. Thus, that is why the Specialty Score exists - it's often times a better rating for specialty type bikes. On the Specialty Score, the Aventon Aventure scored forty-eight out of a hundred.

Let's get back into the Tower Score on this eBike.

Materials Quality - 2/10

The first attribute we looked at for the Aventure is materials quality. We like to look at materials quality first because we believe it's usually a good telltale sign of what the bike is worth. Usually, a company that doesn’t provide high-quality materials will cheap out on other areas of the bike.

Also, usually, if you notice that the exterior parts of the bike are made of cheap materials, you’ll find the same to be true in the e-bike’s interior components as well. That’ll be detrimental to the rider; especially when we get into the electrical components. It’s something to consider because the Aventure scored very low here. We found this particularly odd as the aesthetic of the Aventon eBikes are actually pretty good, but they just seem to achieve that with cheaper materials so durability is likely an issue here.

The Aventure is equipped with Kenda tires. Kenda tires are fairly common and popular, but they are also a low-budget option. If you’re touting a rugged bike, one that’s made for the outdoors and for off-roading, and then you put cheap tires on it, we find that somewhat ridiculous. We would've liked to see a more trusted name tire brand; one that should be a bit more flat-resistant.

Another thing that we didn't like is it does come with a cheap thumb throttle. It would have been acceptable were it only a high-quality component. You can expect the thumb throttle to break down the line. With that being said, we should consider that it is a low-cost item. It wouldn't be difficult to replace, even if it would force you to spend a bit more, but it's a hassle for you the customer. Going with quality here instead of junk literally costs the brand a few dollars difference. It's silly to skimp.

We find the same story to be true regarding the LCD display. The Aventure has a nice and large LCD screen right in the middle of the handlebars. However, we found that the exterior buttons of the PA aren't of good enough quality. They interact well with the LCD screen, but they don't feel good to use. Not to mention that they look relatively cheap. This seems to be a consistent theme on this bike, it looks shiny and nice when you take a superficial look, but if you really dig into things you find a lot of corners cut.

The same goes with the seat. The seat has good adjustability, which we'll talk about later. But it is a relatively low-quality seat. The last thing you want to do is to invest thousands of dollars into an e-bike and find the seats to be cheap and uncomfortable. You're going to have to spend even more money to get it replaced or worse, not want to ride the bike at all.

There were a lot of undesirable components on this e-bike but there are good things about it as well. It has 36H stainless steel spokes. This is nice to see. It has some rust resistance. And again, the LCD screen in the middle was also quite nice to see even though it’s a low-quality component. Overall, though it gets a 2 on materials quality, which isn't very good.

Mechanical Quality - 6/10

The second attribute we looked at was mechanical quality. In this category, we try to see just how mechanically sound of a bike this product is. It isn’t uncommon for people to be swayed by the superfluous marketing around an e-bike. Also, most shoppers only care about how fast or how far the e-bike can go. However, there’s so much more to an e-bike than that. Thus, we have our professional mechanics look at the product from a mechanical standpoint.

When it comes down to it, electric bikes are still bikes. Customers need to make sure that it's great even without the motor. If the battery dies while you’re using the e-bike, is it still going to be easy to ride the bike? Is the derailleur good enough that you’ll be able to switch through gears easily?

We've seen a lot of types of e-bikes come through our repair shop here in San Diego. There are some e-bikes that are almost fully focused on electrical components. Sometimes, when we strip out the electrical components, we’re left with a poorly designed skeleton.

However, for the Aventon Aventure, that wasn’t fully the case. We scored the Aventon Aventure a six out of ten on mechanical quality. It has hydraulic brakes, which is something we highly appreciate. The front suspension is good as well. With hydraulic brakes, you’ll be able to go farther and faster. Because the brakes are essentially a self-adjusting system, you are going to save a lot of time and trips to the repair shop. Which, in turn, saves you a lot of repair costs.

That being said, these hydraulic brakes are unbranded. Meaning, they aren't from any brand that is already reputable and trustworthy. We would’ve liked to see Tektro or Shimano.

Again, the bike does come with suspension, which is nice to see. This is especially true for an electric mountain bike. It's going to make riding the e-bike easier and a lot calmer. If you go off-roading as you would with an electric mountain bike, you’ll surely appreciate this feature.

However, the bike’s derailleur is relatively cheap. The same goes for its chains. They aren’t rust-resistant. All of these factors combined are why the Aventure scored a six out of ten. It could be better but it sure isn’t awful.

Low Maintenance - 5/10

The third category is low maintenance. The Aventure scored a five out of ten on low maintenance. Hydraulic brakes are self-adjusting brakes and, again, we see this on the Aventure. E-bikes will typically score better in this category for simply having hydraulic brakes. With the brake fluid in the hydraulic brakes, they are going to even out on the brake pad wear. You won't have to do that.

By working at an e-bike repair shop all day long, I’ve observed that most of our customers come in specifically for brake adjustments. The reason is that their e-bikes have mechanical brakes instead of hydraulic ones. Hydraulic brakes save you so much time and monetary cost from repairs.

Going back to the fact that they have Kenda tires, they aren't super flat-resistant; especially for an electric mountain bike. We always want to see flat-resistant tires. Flats can be a real pain to deal with; not to mention fixing them on electric bikes. It takes a lot of skill and patience because of the extra weight of electric bikes and all the electrical connections that can get in the way.

Then, the last thing we want to touch on is the fact that this bike does have multiple gears. Having multiple gears is always great; however, specifically for this category, it is not. Why? Because having a multiple gearing system also means that more things can go wrong. It is a great feature but one which comes with cons from a maintenance standpoint. The quote “more power comes with more responsibility” is felicitous here. You see, the issue when a brand goes with gears but cheaps out on the components, you create a maintenance issue.

The Aventure has a nice eight-speed gearing system; meaning you can switch into eight different gears. That is a glad-to-have feature; however, you're going to have to be on top of chain-stretch maintenance and you must also make sure that the relative ease of switching through gears is maintained. Else, it’ll seem rougher to ride the e-bike. If there is something wrong with that derailleur and you're not able to switch into a gear, that's going to be something that's going to need to be maintained, preferably by an e-bike mechanic. What does that mean? More expenses.

Hill-climbing Ability - 9/10

The next attribute we looked at is hill-climbing ability. The Aventure scored great on the hill-climbing ability category. We tested it here locally at a huge San Diego hill. We scored the Aventon Aventure a nine out of ten.

This is in large part due to its 750-watt sustained motor; emphasis on sustained! A lot of e-bike companies will tout their 750-watt motors, but what they're really saying is that that's the peak wattage, meaning the peak at which the product can reach. But, at how much power can it actually sustain itself for a period of time? So many brands are really telling you a 500-watt motor is a 750-watt motor because, well, who's going to call them out? We will ;)

Being able to sustain power is what you're looking for here and to their credit the Aventure does not disappoint. The Aventure’s online product page indicates that they have a 750-watt motor, and we found that to be true. Its peak wattage can even go up to close to a thousand watts. This is impressive. Good on the company for delivering more than it is marketing.

There's a ton of power on this motor. On top of all that, it even has a 48-volt system as well as those eight-speed gears. You can switch into low gear and fly up a hill. Online, it does state that the Aventure can go 28/mph. We don’t think that’s accurate. We found that the bike can go to about 20/mph. Whereas if you do use the pedal-assist feature, in about three or four pedal assist levels, you'll be able to go around 24-25/mph. This is fantastic. It exceeded our expectations with regards to its hill-climbing ability.

Again, on hill-climbing ability, the Aventure scored a nine out of ten.

E-Bike Range - 2/10

The 5th attribute is range. This bike has a 750-watt motor, 15Ah, 48-volt battery system. However, we were a little disappointed. Online, it’s stated that you can go to about 45 miles on a single charge. We simply found that to be false. Even with levels 3 to 4 on pedal-assist, we were only getting close to about 25 miles. 25 miles is nowhere near 45 miles. It seems that they overstretched here quite a bit! Maybe if you're just straight using pedal-assist level one, you may get closer to that 45-mile range, but certainly not if you're using just the throttle.

Using straight throttle and not pedaling will get to about 20 miles on this battery. This is in large part just because the battery itself doesn’t come from a reputable and trusted brand. This is a highly-discussed topic in the e-bike world. If you’re getting an electric bicycle, you're going to want to make sure that you get a battery that has branded cells, meaning the cells within the battery are either Samsung, LG, or Panasonic. The reason you want to get one of those is just that those companies have outstanding and established quality-control measures. They have standards for what they're putting their name on. And that quality costs. A quality battery can be 25%-35% of the production cost of an eBike. Brands that skimp on batteries can cut massive costs, but you the customer is getting the short end of the stick at the end of the day here, and it's not apparent until you start to experience degradation and frustration with exaggerated marketing claims that don't come true.

When you're getting an e-bike that has unbranded cells, you're running the risk of getting a cheap BMS system and cheap Chinese quality cells that are going to deteriorate in no time. Unfortunately, that's the case here with Aventon Aventure, they have unbranded cells. The results of our range tests are in sync with our opinions about its batteries. You won't go too far without pedaling the bike yourself. Being limited to 25-30 miles is not dangerous, but a nuance. And you can expect degradation of those numbers after just a few months of ownership and use.

On range, the Aventure scored a two out of ten. Not great.

Electric Bike Comfort - 7/10

The next attribute we looked at is comfort. On comfort, the Aventure scored a seven out of ten. We found the bike comfortable. Again, touching back on the fact that it does have that nice front suspension to it. If you do go off-road and go up a mountain with lots of bumps, it's mostly going to be a pleasant ride. The suspension and the tires are going to take most of the blows while cushioning you in the process. The fact that the bike also has 26x4 inch tires and that the handlebars are easy to reach, especially for a mountain bike, helps in this category.

We were a little surprised, but the actual riding position of the Aventure is mostly upright. This is highly appreciated as it alleviates back-strain. The only area that this e-bike failed in terms of comfort is the seat itself. Because the seat is a critical component when it comes to comfort, we recommend switching it out.

Universality - 6/10

The 7th attribute we reviewed is universality. Universality looks at just how many demographics of riders is this bike capable of serving? Can it accommodate shorter riders? How about really tall ones? What about our stouter friends? Is there a weight limit on this e-bike?

On universality, we gave the bike a six out of ten. It has a nice seat post height. We imagine that most riders will be comfortable with this. The seat post has a ton of room for adjustments. We measured it at 27 inches; meaning there's a lot of play in that seat post height. If you’re a shorter rider, you will be fine. You can move that seat down with the stem and have a lower riding position.

The same goes if you are a tall rider. You can easily put the seat post higher and make it comfortable for you. The only thing we didn't like is that the handlebars don't go back and forth. We find this to be a big deal. You can only move the handlebars up and down. You can't twist the bars to move closer to you or change the positioning when you’re uncomfortable with the sitting position it imposes on you.

Again, on universality score, the Aventure scored a six out of ten.

Tower e-Bike Score (53) and Specialty Score (48)

That's our Tower Score. Again, the Aventure scored 53 out of a hundred, earning itself a mediocre e-bike rating. Then, touching back on the Specialty Score, the Aventure scored a 48. This also means that it gets a mediocre e-bike rating on that front.

Weight = 73 pounds

One more thing we haven’t touched on, but should, is the weight of the e-bike. We don't factor this into the eBike Score, but we do put all eBikes on our scale to give you the honest weight with the battery attached. This is important to consider when choosing your e-bike. The Aventure is 73 pounds. That's way on the heavier side in contrast to the typical e-bike. We like to see e-bikes in the 40 to 50 pounds range; especially for a mountain bike that you may be lugging on a rack or at the back of a car often. 73 pounds is a lot.

Before making the purchase decision, try to imagine lifting this 73-pound bike over and over again from where it is to where you want it to be.

Electric Bike Looks

Apart from the weight, we also want to give our opinions about the looks of the e-bike. Upon purchase, you automatically get a front and rear fender with the Aventure. Although they are low-quality, it does give it a nice mountain bike look. The battery is hidden inside the frame. We tend to favor that sometimes on the looks front. A lot of electric mountain bikes almost look like a motorcycle or something close to it. The Aventure maintains its mountain bike look in contrast to most other e-bikes. Overall, we liked how it looks.

Low Proprietary Risk Score - 3/10

The last thing we want to touch on is something we call the low proprietary risk score. Again, this score isn't factored into the Tower E-Bike Score, but we like to give you a 1-10 rating on it. We’re defining how proprietary this bike is. The unfortunate truth is that about 95% of e-bike brands existing today are going to go out of business in the next 5-10 years. There’s simply no room to hold the vastness of e-bike brands in one niche. Thus, on a score of one to ten, we rate how easy it is for shoppers to get replacement parts for their e-bike. We look at the longevity and reputation of specific brands.

There are so many e-bike companies that spend a lot of money on customer acquisition costs and on advertisements but don't have a sustainable business model. The last thing we want to see is a customer with no hope of repairing their e-bike because the company they bought it from no longer exists and no other manufacturer manufactures the specific proprietary parts in their product. Keep in mind that a brand that has dissolved will not be able to give any type of customer service or after-sales support.

We like to provide our insight on proprietary parts for each e-bike. For the low proprietary risk, the Aventure scored a three out of ten. Meaning, most of its parts are proprietary and you are at the mercy of only Aventon. You're riding or dying with them, and because of the industry the odds are 19 out of 20 they won't last long. Not great odds.

The only thing that's standard on this bike is those Kenda bike tires. Everything else, we found to be non-standard. The battery pack and the controller, being the most fundamental aspect of an e-bike, are highly proprietary. Also, the Aventure sports a non-branded motor. Similar to how we’d like to see branded battery cells, we would love to see branded motors as well. We like to see Bafang or Bosch, or another trusted motor brand. That way, if you do have issues further down the line, a trusted and reputable company can offer you an e-bike mechanic and service your bike.

Case in point, our mechanics here at Tower Electric Bike Repair Shop are familiar with Bafang and Bosch motors. Thus, whether the bike is from Aventon or not, we would be able to help riders with their e-bike motor problems. Whereas if you get an unknown motor, it’ll be more challenging to fix. If you buy a non-branded motor, you’ll find that there isn't a lot of knowledge on them simply because they are proprietary.

That's our review on the Aventon Aventure. Let us know what you think of this e-bike. Check out our site for Tower Scores on a growing list of other e-bikes that we see coming through our repair shop.