Half the fun of summer is anticipation—stockpiling your beach towels and Bluetooth speakers well in advance of all the block parties and beach days. However, right smack dab in the middle of summer is a fine time to buy things too. Anticipation is one thing, but right now is the time when we’re all discovering that, uh, that cooler we thought was fine has sprung a leak. Or your children’s bikes are too small and need to be replaced now that they’re riding them daily.
Not all of the bikes we like are on Amazon or are being pitched as Prime Day electric bike deals. However, several companies are posting summer sales we think are worthy of your time. If you have decided that the last thing you want to do with your one wild and precious life is sit in a car in traffic in the baking summer heat, and you want to ride an electric bike through the baking heat instead, these are some deals worth checking out on some of our favorite bikes. We’ve also found a few great electric scooter deals too if you’d rather not pedal at all.
Don’t forget to check out our Absolute Best Prime Day Deals roundup and our Prime Day Live Blog for more discounts on our favorite, WIRED-tested products.
We test products year-round and handpicked these deals. We’ll update this guide periodically throughout the sale event.
WIRED Featured Deals
The Best Electric Bike Deals
Specialized’s summer sales event has several bikes we’ve written fondly about. The company’s designs don’t change much from year to year (if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it), and if this is the year you’re finally going to cave and get a new electric mountain bike (eMTB), the Turbo Levo Comp (8/10, WIRED Recommends) should probably be it. The Levo uses the same frame as the iconic Stumpjumper, except with a custom-designed, seamlessly integrated motor that allows partners of varying fitness levels to ride with one another. Riding an eMTB with my much fitter, faster spouse is a way to spend the day together without him having to ditch me on the baby trails.
If you’re looking for a more multipurpose ride, the Turbo Tero X 4.0 (8/10, WIRED Recommends) is also on sale for $3,750 ($750 off). It has mountain bike features on a not-specifically mountain bike frame; i.e., it is pretty heavy at 58 pounds, and I’m not sure I would take it on singletrack. But it is pretty great for rough commutes and would be a great bikepacking ebike.
Aventon started out as a fixie manufacturer in Long Beach, California, but pivoted to ebikes in 2017 and started making them at sometimes alarmingly affordable prices. Happily, we like almost everything we’ve tested, but probably the best value is the cargo bike. It has a 750-watt rear hub motor with a torque sensor. It’s also endlessly customizable with Aventon’s proprietary accessories, which is great luck for you because Aventon is currently holding a flash sale and they’re all free. The company is also offering a free battery with the purchase of some of its other, older models; we also liked the Aventure.2 (8/10, WIRED Recommends)
Our favorite budget electric bike, the Propella 9S Pro V2, is on presale for August and is $100 off. Propella is a direct-to-consumer company, and it makes its bikes in batches—the 9S Pro V2 is the company’s top seller, so this is the perfect time to pick one up. It’s one of our favorite bikes that looks and feels pretty much like a regular bike, with a little boost to help you get home at the end of the day.
It’s 43.5 pounds, so it’s pretty light (for an ebike), and it’s one of the easiest direct-to-consumer bikes to assemble. Three things worth noting: It’s a class 1 ebike, so it only assists up to 20 mph and doesn’t have a throttle. Second, the thumb toggle on the display is so small and discreet that almost no one I’ve shown the bike has been able to find it or realized what it was. And third, if you want a Propella but your budget is $1,000, the cheaper 7-speed is also on sale for $100 off.
If you’re in the market for a family cargo electric bike, and your children are under the age of 5, I would recommend the Urban Arrow (8/10, WIRED Recommends). Both Urban Arrow and Gazelle are part of the Dutch-owned Pon bike conglomerate, and the Dutch know from bikes. The Urban Arrow is much more maneuverable and easier to steer than a lot of the big cargo front box bikes that I’ve tested. It’s much lower to the ground, and it has a high-performance Bosch CX drivetrain with an Enviolo variable transmission hub, so it has both the power to get you where you need to go and a shifter that won’t leave you stuck (you can shift from a standstill, so you don’t have that moment of terror where you think everything might just go tumbling over if you’re not strong enough). I first wrote about the Urban Arrow in 2020 and have never seen it go on sale. If you’re considering one, you should jump on this.
There was a time when it seemed you could not look in Rad Power Bikes’ direction without seeing some lawsuit or another being slung at the company. Those days seem to be in the past; the company has a new CEO who is refocusing on safety. The RadRover 6 Plus is part of a closeout sale to make way for the new models; it may not have the new encapsulated SafeShield batteries that help prevent battery fires, but it is UL-certified and has a powerful 750-watt battery. The thick tires make for a smooth ride, and it handily got me up the 15-degree hill I’ve nicknamed “Battery Killer” without a qualm.
If you already have a Rad Power Bike (it’s one of the ebikes I see most often around my home in Portland, Oregon), the Rad Hot Summer sale has deals on components and accessories, like SafeShield batteries. For example, if you liked my review of the Radster Road (8/10, WIRED Recommends), you can get a free accessory for under $200, like a locking pannier to store things on your bike like the trunk of a car.
The Best Kids Bike Deals
Only select colors are on sale. Our full review of the Cleary is forthcoming, and we will be including it in our Best Kids’ Bikes guide, but my 9-year-old has been testing it for a few weeks, and both of us are thrilled. If you’ve been waiting for this day to get your kid riding trails, I want to make a strong argument for the Cleary here. First, the geometry is fun and kid-specific. My daughter was too big for a 20-incher and just a little too small to comfortably fit a lot of 24-inch bikes, but the Cleary’s bottom bracket is very low. My daughter can ride it comfortably, but the seat also moves backward as you move it up so her reach stays comfortable and consistent.
She’s thrilled to be on a bike that’s almost as big as mine, with big knobbly tires that let her ride on all sorts of surfaces. While your kid probably doesn’t need suspension if they’re as light as my daughter is, you also can customize the Cleary as you go by adding a kickstand, front fork, and bigger tires. It has the requisite disc brakes, but I also love the internal hub. This means lower maintenance for us Pacific Northwesteners and our mud problems but also reduces the chance of chain dropouts. This is necessary since I’m not quite sure my kids have gotten the hang of shifting yet and they always sound like they’re furiously shaking dice in a can behind me.
My daughter rode this bike from the age of 5 to about 7. The standout feature is the SureStop brake system—as you can see, it only has one handbrake, and the brake cables are threaded such that the rear brake always activates first before the front brake so your child can never side-slip or flip. I found the cable more annoying than it had to be—sometimes it would get tangled around the wheel when I was putting her bike in the back of my car—but it does offer reassurance if your child is just getting used to hand brakes.
If your child has been having trouble transitioning to biking without training wheels, you might want to consider getting them a Guardian; it weighs 20 pounds, which is about half of what a bike from your average big box store might weigh. It’s also one of the easiest bikes to assemble right out of the box. All of Guardian’s bikes are on sale right now, and the company offers sizes from a balance bike to a full-size 26-inch bike. To find the right size, use the company’s Ridesizer tool.
Best Electric Scooter Deals
If you want a cheap electric scooter, this is the best price we’ve tracked on the Segway E2 Plus. This is WIRED editor Julian Chokkattu’s pick for the best budget escooter, and it weighs a positively petite 32 pounds. In his testing, Chokkattu found it only got about 10 miles of range. But let’s be honest, he’s 6’4″ and weighs 240 pounds, which I recently realized is more than both me and my two children combined. You’ll probably get better range.
As someone with a garage currently full of electric bikes, I fully support renting a scooter on a temporary basis (say, for example, the last half of summer). Unagi’s membership lets you subscribe on a monthly basis, with free shipping, service, and theft and damage insurance included. For Prime Day, Unagi is giving you a free two-month subscription (with a $50 setup fee) that will also include a carrying satchel for the perfect last-mile scooter (8/10, WIRED Recommends). If you’ve been curious about that scooter lifestyle and didn’t want to shell out $1,500 right off the bat—or if you’re just tired of trudging those last sweaty steps back to your apartment in the summer heat—this is definitely worth a shot.
This is our favorite electric kick scooter at the moment (8/10, WIRED Recommends). It weighs a reasonable 46 pounds and offers plenty of power thanks to the dual 350-watt motors (you get a top speed of 28 mph). It can suit riders up to 265 pounds. It has extra perks too, like a reliable app, turn signals, and regenerative braking. Apollo’s Prime Sale also nets you 20 percent off two or more accessories—like a fast charger, air pump, or phone holder—and free shipping.