3 Ways to Stay Safe On an E-Bike
E-bikes can be convenient and fun, but using one comes with some dangers. Here are the steps you can take to lower your risk, according to experts.
Electric bikes are everywhere. Even if you’ve never used one yourself, chances are good you’ve seen one zip by on a street or trail. A nationally representative survey of 2,035 U.S. adults conducted by Consumer Reports in February 2024 found that 11 percent of Americans had ridden an e-bike in the past 12 months. And nearly 1 million e-bikes were bought or sold across the U.S. in 2024, according to PeopleForBikes, a national bicycling advocacy nonprofit and the U.S. bicycle industry’s trade association.
E-bikes look a lot like traditional bikes, but they get a power assist from a built-in motor and battery. That makes them great for climbing hills or speeding up when you’re coasting on a flat stretch. But those higher speeds can contribute to more serious accidents–particularly if you don’t take the right precautions.
While the popularity of e-bikes has grown, so too have injuries tied to accidents. Experts have seen a surge in trauma cases caused by e-bike accidents, according to a 2026 study published online in Neurosurgery, the official journal of the Congress of Neurological Surgeons (CNS).
What’s more, a separate 2024 study published in JAMA Surgery found that from 2017 to 2022 there was a 30-fold increase in e-bike injuries.
In 2022, the incidence of head trauma from e-bike injuries was approximately 49 times higher than it was in 2017.
Don’t Modify Your E-Bike’s Speed
E-bikes have motors that automatically turn off and stop assisting the rider once a certain speed is reached. That motor has a mechanism called a speed limiter, controller, or governor, and it’s a safety feature designed to keep you from riding too fast.
The CPSC is the federal agency responsible for regulating the safety of e-bikes and has outlined the maximum motor power (less than 750W) and speeds (under 20 mph on motor power alone, up to 28 mph for Class 3 pedal-assist), which are also performance limits set by federal and state laws. Both limitations are typically built into firmware or software running on the speed limiter’s circuitry. That said, the CPSC still hasn’t offered clear, federal classifications on which e-bikes fall into which e-bike classes. (CR endorsed the Safe SPEEDS Act to address this, which we discuss below.)
“The controller is essentially the ‘brain’ of an electric bicycle,” says Matt Moore, general and policy counsel for PeopleForBikes. “It receives information from the sensors and drive system, monitors and regulates the performance of the battery and motor, and serves as an interface with the operator.”
The problem is that for someone who wants to travel faster than their e-bike allows, there are many ways to manipulate or disable safety controls. In some cases, riders can use “magnets, keystrokes, apps, and tuning kits, and other devices to shut off the speed limiter and allow the motor to keep operating at much higher speeds,” says Maa.
‘A car does not have a controller,’ Maa says. ‘An e-bike with the controller turned off is like a car.’
“Think of a car. You can drive it 100 mph or faster, and far exceed the lawful speed limit. A car does not have a controller,” Maa says. “An e-bike with the controller turned off is like a car.” So, much like a car, the only thing limiting speed on a modified e-bike is the driver’s judgment. But unlike a car, there’s little in the way of protection if you crash.
E-bike tuning kits can be particularly problematic. Tuning kits are aftermarket devices (or software applications) that can help users bypass factory-installed speed limits. Modifications using tuning kits “usually result in increased motor strength and speed, making the e-bike illegal,” Burruss says.
“With speed restrictions, the severity of injuries will decrease,” Burruss says. “Existing data demonstrates that e-bike injuries are more similar to motorcycle injuries, likely due to the higher speeds.” The higher speeds also mean e-bike riders have less time to respond to obstacles on the road while wearing less protection than motorcyclists.
California passed a bill in 2024 that banned aftermarket speed-modification devices that push e-bikes past legal limits, Burruss says. A year later, California cracked down on aftermarket apps designed to alter an e-bike’s speed controls.
New Jersey has also banned e-bike tuning kits. They are likely not banned more widely because there’s little data showing they cause significant harm, says Ken McLeod, policy director of The League of American Bicyclists. “The lack of data may reflect issues with data collection, that these tuning kits are not widely used, or that e-bikes with tuning kits are not involved in many crashes.” Even if tuning kits are not widely used, the potential damage they can lead to is still severe.
The Safe SPEEDS Act would require the CPSC to clearly define classes for different types of e-bikes, implement labeling requirements, establish minimum age recommendations, and ban e-bikes that are designed to have their speeds modified. (The bipartisan bill was introduced in the House by Reps. Dave Min and Jared Huffman of California, Mike Lawler of New York, and Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania. It has been endorsed by CR, PeopleForBikes, The League of American Bicyclists, and others.)
If we could manage to truly enforce speed limits, Maa says, we might be able to get a better handle on e-bike injuries and deaths.
If we could manage to truly enforce speed limits, Maa says, we might be able to get a better handle on e-bike injuries and deaths. “Issuing tickets for exceeding the speed limit, especially on sidewalks, is required,” he says.
Wear the Right Helmet on Your E-Bike
In May 2026, a study published online in Neurosurgery found that of 914 patients who sought care from a specific hospital system for trauma involving micromobility-related injuries, only 31.7 percent were wearing a helmet.
‘The bikes collided, and the patient hit their head hard on the pavement,’ Burruss says. ‘They were not wearing a helmet and suffered brain death.’
The worst injury that Burruss has seen involved a patient who was riding a bicycle and was then hit by another bicyclist on an e-bike at high speeds. “The bikes collided, and the patient hit their head hard on the pavement,” Burruss says. “They were not wearing a helmet and suffered brain death.”
Though this is much less common than the milder traumatic brain injuries she sees, even the mildest brain injuries can affect patients’ lives–from post-concussive symptoms to an inability to return to work or school in the same capacity as before. “UC Irvine (UCI) [Health] has a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) [Survivors] Support Group, and a few of the participants have head injuries from e-bike crashes and are still dealing with the post-TBI consequences,” Burruss says.
She adds that if all e-bike riders wore helmets–along with the enactment of other preventive measures around e-bike riding, such as speed restrictions and age limits–we would see a “drastic reduction in injury and deaths.”
“I have seen countless children and adults without helmets who suffer traumatic brain injuries and facial fractures,” she says. “The severity would be substantially less with helmet use.” Burruss, who works in Orange, California, shares a statistic similar to that of the aforementioned study: “At UCI, only about 30 percent of our e-bike-injured patients were wearing helmets.”
“Consistent helmet use remains the most important protective behavior,” Maa says. The CPSC recommends a moped or motorcycle helmet for speeds of 20 miles per hour or higher.
Phyllis Agran, MD, shared the Virginia Tech Helmet Ratings, which include an e-bike tab. Virginia Tech, in collaboration with the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, evaluated 311 bike helmets using the STAR testing system, assessing each helmet’s ability to reduce both “linear acceleration and rotational velocity during a range of impact scenarios representative of real-world bicycle crashes.” The more stars under a helmet, the lower the risk of concussion. Virginia Tech recommends choosing a helmet with 4 or 5 stars.
CR has written about whether you need an e-bike-specific helmet and which helmets we tested we would recommend to an e-bike rider.
Don't Let Children Under 12 Ride an E-Bike
Raising the minimum age to ride an e-bike could significantly reduce e-bike injuries. The U.S. is a “major outlier compared to other nations,” Maa says.
“The current Class 1 and Class 2 system reflect very different bikes,” Burruss says. Class 2 e-bikes are much more similar to mopeds, especially when modified, due to the throttle-only mechanism. Maa offered one solution, which could be to require that Class 1 e-bike users be 12 years and older, while Class 2 and 3 e-bike riders must be 16 years and older.
In general, pediatricians and the CPSC recommend that children under 12 should not operate any e-bike that travels faster than 10 mph, and many experts feel that further restrictions on children riding e-bikes would reduce deaths and injury severity.
Because there’s no federal minimum age, regulations are set by individual states and municipalities. Many states acknowledge the risk to children from operating faster devices and prohibit anyone younger than 16 from operating a Class 3 e-bike.
Bonus: Take an E-Bike Safety Course
All the experts we spoke to recommended easily accessible courses to learn how to ride an e-bike safely.
“First, children should learn how to ride a conventional bike,” Agran says. “Part of this is learning the rules of the road, navigating pathways, shared road use, helmet use, and the skill set required to operate a conventional bike,” he says. In an ideal world, states should require e-bike riders to acquire a license that ensures they have the special knowledge and skills, training, and competence that a motorcycle rider has, Agran adds.
PeopleForBikes worked with the Motorcycle Safety Foundation to create a comprehensive online safety course, Moore says. “We highly recommend this course for both adults and youth.” PeopleForBikes also worked with The League of American Bicyclists to develop a guide to help people ride an e-bike safely.
Burruss says that every city and school district should offer a range of training programs, such as the California Highway Patrol Electric Bicycle Training and Safety Course. The Irvine School District, where she lives, requires children who ride their e-bikes to school to take an e-bike safety course hosted by the Irvine Police Department. “It is quite excellent, having sat through it myself with my son,” Burruss says.
Understanding E-Bike Classes
In 2015, PeopleForBikes worked with e-bike manufacturers to develop the three-class system that 45 U.S. states now use to differentiate e-bikes by motor-assist, pedal-assist, wattage, and operational rules (more details below).
States have adopted it piecemeal, resulting in a patchwork of conflicting state laws on age limits, speeds, helmet requirements, and motor wattage, Maa says.
However, some medical professionals find the three-class system counterproductive. Agran says the terminology “has created tremendous confusion among the public, the consumers, and the parents who purchase these bikes for children.” States have adopted it piecemeal, resulting in a patchwork of conflicting state laws on age limits, speeds, helmet requirements, and motor wattage, Maa says.
In our electric bike buying guide, we cover the three general “classes” (or classifications) of e-bikes related to their electric propulsion systems. Each type powers the bike’s driven wheel in a distinct way, whether using input from the rider’s pedals or a hand control, like a twist grip or a thumb switch.
- Class 1 bikes can reach speeds as high as 20 mph using pedal-assist, a feature that powers the electric motor as you pedal. There’s no throttle control on the handlebars to get the bike going; the electric motor works only when the rider is pedaling.
- Class 2 bikes can reach up to 20 mph, either while the rider is pedaling (pedal-assist) or with electric propulsion alone via a throttle.
- Class 3 bikes can reach up to 28 mph. These faster, more powerful models might not be legal to ride in some areas, such as on bike paths.
A Look Ahead at E-Bike Safety
Electric bikes are already heavily regulated as consumer products and as vehicles, says Moore, with motor power and speed limits set by federal law. E-bikes must meet CPSC safety regulations and be certified by their manufacturers as compliant.
But the CPSC relies on a decades-old definition of a “low-speed e-bike,” and no safety standard specific to e-bikes currently exists, meaning that, at the federal level, e-bikes are still effectively regulated as regular, human-powered bicycles. In 2024, the CPSC initiated rulemaking to establish standards governing the mechanical safety of e-bikes.
In comments to the agency, CR urged that the e-bike definition be expanded to include Class 3 pedal-assist models, and that federal rules establish that any bike capable of exceeding 20 mph on motor power alone should be regulated as a motor vehicle subject to Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) set by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. To date, the agency has gathered only public feedback on the proposal. No official draft rule or finalized standard has been published.
After talking with experts, other safety concerns include the language used and the definitions of e-bikes and e-motos.
An e-bike meets the standards of the three-class system, with speeds no higher than 20 or 28 mph, McLeod says. He cites the federal definition of a low-speed e-bike, which defines an e-bike as a “two-or-three-wheeled vehicle, with fully operable pedals, and an electric motor of less than 750 watts, whose maximum speed on a paved level surface, when powered solely by such a motor while ridden by an operator who weighs 170 pounds, is less than 20 mph.” By definition, McLeod says, an e-moto is any e-bike that goes faster than 20 mph with a throttle or 28 mph with pedal assist, that may not be marketed as an e-bike but does not meet the standards of a motorcycle.
Distinguishing e-bikes from e-motos is important, so that “legal e-bikes are not restricted by efforts that confuse them,” McLeod says, and so the legality of e-motos can be “addressed separately from e-bikes, rather than conflated with them.” Some states, including California, Utah, Minnesota, Colorado, Connecticut, and Hawaii, have passed legislation to narrow their definition of “e-bike” to exclude most e-moto products–and to create new regulations around e-motos, says Moore.
Currently, PeopleForBikes and other advocates are sponsoring a bill in California that targets e-motos, their sellers, and their advertising practices to address the worst practices associated with these products.
Moore says that PeopleForBikes would also like to see “more active enforcement by NHTSA of FMVSS and importer regulations that apply to e-motos intended for on-road use.”
‘States, counties, and cities all have varying regulations that make it challenging for even the knowledgeable consumer to keep track of what is legal e-bike use.’
In any case, a “unified approach is necessary,” Burruss says, since e-bike manufacturers are selling across the U.S. “States, counties, and cities all have varying regulations that make it challenging for even the knowledgeable consumer to keep track of what is legal e-bike use.”
She also advocates for “three separate spaces” on the road, one for walking pedestrians, one for bicyclists, and one for motor vehicles. Right now, e-bikes occupy the same space as traditional cyclists, but travel at much faster speeds, increasing the risk of a crash and injuries.
‘A bike with a motor is a motorized vehicle, not a bike anymore,’ Maa says.
Maa says that federal action is needed to reclassify e-bikes as motorized vehicles under the jurisdiction of the DOT and NHTSA and to require licensure, registration, proof of insurance, and education requirements. “A bike with a motor is a motorized vehicle, not a bike anymore,” Maa says.
Aside from issues largely tied to speed, the batteries and electrical systems that power e-bikes pose unique risks of their own. Safety standards for e-bikes batteries and the electrical systems are voluntary at the national level, though some jurisdictions, such as New York, require them. CR endorses legislation to create a binding federal standard for batteries, but it’s been held up for a few years despite strong bipartisan support and support from firefighters and fire chiefs. The CPSC recently issued a proposed rule to establish a safety standard for electrical systems that use lithium-ion batteries in micromobility products such as e-scooters and e-bikes. CR submitted comments to the agency, noting that strong, mandatory standards are long overdue and necessary to prevent fatalities and injuries related to hazardous batteries and battery management systems.
