How to Choose a Portable Electric Scooter (Lightweight, Foldable & Compact)
In this Buyer's Guide:
We'll cover the key factors that you should consider when choosing a portable electric scooter, including:
When choosing a scooter that’s both lightweight and compact, it’s important to focus on more than just weight alone.
From finding the right balance between portability and performance to selecting the best folding mechanisms and ticking the durability box, I’ll guide you through the key factors that matter most.
Find the Perfect Scooter
Check out my recommendations and compare electric scooters below.
Best Foldable Scooters
Best Lightweight Scooters
Weight Categories: Balancing Portability and Performance
The term “lightweight” means different things to different people. Based on my experience, where I’ve tested a wide array of electric scooters, I consider any model weighing less than 45 lbs to be light – anything heavier becomes cumbersome. This is particularly evident when compared to the 60.2 lb average of all the scooters I’ve tested.
Within this limit, however, the weight of different scooters can be categorized into three groups:
Ultra-Light – Less than 30 lbs
Scooters in this category are extremely portable, making them ideal for riders who need to lift or carry their scooters frequently. However, their featherweight design often leads to sacrifices in both battery power and features.
Super-Light – 30-35 lbs
This weight range strikes a good balance between portability and performance. Scooters here typically have slightly bigger batteries and tick all the necessary boxes for essential features while still being easy to carry.
Light – 35-45 lbs
While slightly heavier, scooters in the light category still maintain a manageable weight for most users. They often come equipped with larger batteries, more powerful motors, and advanced features like dual suspension systems. This makes them a great option for those seeking improved performance and top-tier ride quality.
Expert Tip: Remember, while lighter scooters are easier to carry, finding the right balance between weight and performance is crucial.
Foldability & Dimensions: Choosing the Right Setup
Scooters vary in how they fold – some feature single folding joints, while others utilize collapsable handlebars and telescopic stems to enhance portability.
From my experience, those that combine all three achieve the smallest dimensions. Taking measurements from the most and least compact lightweight electric scooters, I found that there can be as much as a 31% difference in total folded size (i.e. length + width + height). The most notable difference, however, is in width. Here, scooters with collapsable handlebars can be up to 73% narrower.
With these observations in mind, it’s important to choose the right combination of folding features for your needs.
Stem Levers
While stem levers are the easiest and quickest mechanisms, they don’t reduce the height of a folded scooter as much as a cantilevered joint.
Located at the foot of the stem, you simply pull back on a lever to release a locking claw and lower the stem until it hooks into the deck or rear fender. Then, when you want to unfold the scooter, you unhook the handlebars, lift the stem until it sits flush with the folding joint, and close the lever to lock it in place. This whole process usually takes a matter of seconds.
Cantilevered Joints
Cantilevered joints are commonly found on smaller, more portable electric scooters since they can reduce folded height by up to 33% more than stem levers.
A release lever tends to be located at the neck (where the stem meets the deck). Pulling on this disengages the locking mechanism that holds the stem upright and allows you to fold the scooter in the same way that you’d fold a book. Here, the entire stem pivots at the joint so that it can be folded parallel to the deck. This design helps to create a more compact, flat folded form and makes a scooter easier to carry since its weight is more evenly distributed.
However, the folding process can feel less intuitive and take longer, especially as many scooters with cantilevered joints have secondary safety latches/clips that lock the folded/unfolded stem in place.
Collapsable Handlebars
Put simply, these allow you to fold a scooter's handlebars parallel to its stem. This feature is particularly useful if you need to store your scooter in a tight space or carry it through busy areas since its folded form will be extremely narrow. To put this into perspective, the narrowest dimensions that I’ve seen measure just 5.7 inches. By comparison, the average handlebar width of lightweight scooters that don’t share this feature is 21.5 inches.
Most collapsible handlebars come with simple-to-use mechanisms that either use screw or pull-release cuffs. As the name suggests, the former requires you to unscrew the threaded cuffs when you want to fold them. This takes around 20-30 seconds, but the silver lining is that their design allows you to tighten the cuffs to eliminate wiggle room.
On the other hand, pull-release cuffs are designed so that you can quickly pull the handgrips away from the T-bar before folding them. Over time, however, you may find that the grips develop some wiggle. Here, you need to make sure that you can tighten the grub screws on either side of the T-bar to fill the wiggle space.
Telescopic Stems
Aside from being able to retract the stem to make the length of your folded scooter shorter, telescopic stems add a layer of customization and comfort by letting you adjust the height of the handlebars to fit your preferences. This is especially beneficial for promoting a more ergonomic riding position.
However, when choosing a scooter with a telescopic stem it’s important to ensure that they come with strong locking mechanisms to secure the sections in place. This helps to keep the handlebars stable and prevents the stem from collapsing mid-ride.
The tubular section that’s nested in the outer stem will often have markings to indicate the maximum and minimum height levels, too. Exceeding these can compromise the stability and safety of your scooter, so it's important to stay within the recommended adjustment range.
Carry-Friendly Designs: How a Scooter’s Folded Form Affects Carryability
While we’ve established that weight plays an important role, a key yet often overlooked area of design that directly impacts portability is the shape of a scooter when folded.
Triangular Folded Shape
Scooters that fold using anchored levers at the stem typically create a triangular shape when fully collapsed. Here, a scooter’s steering column is angled downward with its handlebars resting on the deck or rear fender. Unfortunately, this results in an unbalanced weight distribution, making it harder to carry. You have to awkwardly lift and shift the scooter until it balances.
Rectangular Folded Shape
Scooters with cantilevered joints that fold at the neck form a rectangular, flat-folded shape. In this design, the stem lies parallel to the deck, creating an even distribution of weight. This not only makes it easier to find the balance point for carrying, but also allows you to get a better grip on the stem.
Durability: Assessing Structural Integrity
Lightweight electric scooters are not always less durable than those that are heavier, but they can be more prone to wear and tear if their design or materials prioritize weight reduction at the expense of strength. To avoid this and choose a scooter that’s been designed and engineered to remain robust, look for the following:
Materials (Strength-to-Weight Ratios)
A well-built scooter should have a sturdy frame made from high-quality materials including 6061 aluminum and carbon fiber.
Both of these are renowned for their excellent strength-to-weight ratios, while they also ensure that scooters can undergo continuous stress from regular use, such as riding over uneven terrain or enduring the vibrations from the road. This is particularly important for resisting the development of cracks and structural failures across components like the frame, handlebars, and folding joints.
CNC Machining
CNC (Computer Numerical Control) uses pre-programmed software to control machines for the manufacturing of specific parts and components. It’s crucial for the durability of lightweight electric scooters because it ensures precise engineering to reduce the likelihood of defects and weak points (such as a weak folding mechanism that rocks the stem back and forth).
It also allows for the optimization of material usage by creating complex geometries that maintain strength while minimizing weight – a key factor in enhancing the balance between portability and performance.
Expert Tip: Aside from these tell-tale signs, you should pay attention to what reviewers say about a scooter’s build. For example, I was fortunate enough to review the Unagi Voyager – an extremely light model that’s been touted as the iPhone of electric scooters – yet despite flaunting an ultra-sleek frame and being constructed from the same carbon fiber used on Elon Musk’s Space-X rockets, it’s one-click folding mechanism let it down.
After pulling on the handlebars while accelerating and braking, I noticed that the stem began to wobble back and forth. The result of this – along with a few other downfalls – was a poor overall riding experience. Herein lies the lesson – just because a scooter seems to tick the boxes of durability, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it’ll perform in the real world. Always make sure to check what real riders say.
Need Help?
Still unsure which scooter to choose? Check out my recommendations and compare models below.
Best Foldable Scooters
