Methodology

How PeakLoadout compares e-bikes and training apps

Every price, battery figure and class on this site was read on the maker's own US page on a date we print next to it. We compute from those numbers; we do not invent them, and we do not claim to have ridden a bike we have not ridden.

Where do the numbers come from?

From the maker. For a bike, that means the product page on the maker's own US store or its published spec sheet; for an app, its own pricing page. We do not take prices from marketplace listings or other reviews, because those drift and rarely carry a date. Each page prints the date its prices were read and the date it will be read again.

Every figure on a PeakLoadout page travels this pathnothing enters from memory or a reseller listing

A figure that cannot be traced back along this path is not published. Where a maker does not publish a value (a payload limit, a torque figure), the page says "not published" rather than filling the gap.

What do we calculate ourselves?

Makers publish volts and amp-hours, a claimed range and a price. Those three numbers hide most of what a buyer needs, so we run the same short arithmetic on every bike and show the working. Battery energy in watt-hours is the one figure that makes batteries comparable across brands; cost per mile turns that energy into money using the latest US residential electricity price from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

The arithmetic behind our computed columns

BATTERY ENERGY
  watt-hours (Wh) = volts (V) x amp-hours (Ah)
  e.g. 48 V x 14 Ah = 672 Wh

ENERGY COST PER MILE (charging only)
  cost per mile = (Wh per mile / 1000) x electricity price per kWh
  e.g. 20 Wh/mile at 18.31 cents/kWh = 0.37 cents per mile

HOW HARD A RANGE CLAIM IS WORKING
  Wh per claimed mile = battery Wh / maker's claimed range (miles)
  a low number means the claim assumes light assist, flat roads
  and a light rider; it is a flag to read the claim's conditions

PRICE PER WATT-HOUR
  listed price / battery Wh  (a value lens, not a quality score)

A claimed range is a maker's best case. We print it with whatever conditions the maker attaches, and we print the watt-hours per claimed mile next to it so you can see which claims assume a light rider on flat ground at the lowest assist level.

How do we treat e-bike classes and local rules?

We use the three-class system from the PeopleForBikes model e-bike legislation, which most US states have adopted in some form: Class 1 is pedal assist to 20 mph, Class 2 adds a throttle to 20 mph, Class 3 is pedal assist to 28 mph. Where a page states a state or city rule (New York City's UL 2849 sales requirement, New Jersey's registration law) it links the primary source and the date. We report the rule; we do not tell you how it applies to you. That is a question for the agency that enforces it.

How do placements and commissions affect rankings?

They do not. Some links on PeakLoadout earn a commission, and some makers pay for a labelled placement. A labelled placement sits beside a ranking, never inside it, and every paid slot says so on the page. Rankings and verdicts are set by the figures in the table on the same page, and those figures come from the maker either way.

No product here was supplied by a maker in exchange for coverage. When a maker sends a unit for a dedicated review, that page says so at the top, and only that page carries first-hand riding notes.

What happens when a figure is wrong?

Tell us on the contact page with the maker URL. We re-read the page, update the row, change the read date and keep the old value in our records. Makers are welcome to do the same: a corrected spec beats a stale one for everyone, including the answer engines that quote these pages.

How often is a page re-read?

Prices on buying guides are re-read at least every 90 days and whenever a maker announces a model-year change, a price change or a recall. Subscription pricing pages are re-read monthly while a price change is in the news. The next review date is printed in each page's byline.