Electric Bike Lana Del Rey Rode at Coachella Gets a Baby Brother

Even if you're interested in electric motorcycles chances are you've never heard of a company called Ryvid. It's a California startup born just a couple of years ago, which, until this week, had only one product on the market, the Anthem.

Marginally made famous by singer Lana Del Rey earlier in April, when she arrived at Coachella on the back of one, the Anthem is a surprisingly good-looking urban commuter with capabilities to match a ride of this caliber: 75 miles (120 km) range, ten horsepower and 72 Nm of torque, and a top speed of 75 mph (120 kph).

Ryvid opened the order books for the Anthem in August 2022, but didn't start delivering the bikes until the fall of 2023. The original MSRP for the bike was $8,995, but that seems to have been quite a lot, so a price cut was performed, bringing the sticker down to $6,495.

But the price cut is not why we're here. What got us talking about Ryvid is the fact that a second model was just launched, and this one is even cheaper and could potentially be a lot more successful.

The new model is called Outset and it's nothing more than a toned-down version of the Anthem, with enough changes to make it more appealing. And its purpose changed a bit as well, as this one is a scrambler-style ride meant for both commuting and a bit of off-road adventure.

Being a derivation of the Anthem, the Outset shares a lot of its components. The rigid folded steel frame, the 72V air-cooled brushless DC motor that spins the wheels, and even the 4.3 kWh battery are the same as on the original bike. Why, even the instrument display and controller have been crossed over from the Anthem.

The two bikes also share one cool feature called reverse gear. As the name says, the system allows the rides to be put in reverse at the push of a button, moving backward at walking speed (five mph/eight kph) to get the rider out of potentially sticky situations.

But the Outset is different in many ways as well, and the differences have to do with how the new model was styled and what it is meant to do.

The new bike features a suspension system with greater travel (6.5 inches for the inverted front fork and 1.8 inches for the rear mono-shock), and the seat on which the rider gets a feel of the road is longer and narrower as well, resembling that of a motocross bike.

Design-wise the Outset makes itself noticed as a different breed of Anthem thanks to the fewer body panels and new design cues for the headlight, mirrors, and handlebar. The repositioning of the footpegs and a longer kickstand also make this two-wheeler set itself apart from the base model.

The changes made to the Anthem to turn it into the smaller Outset mean the new model weighs just 315 pounds (143 kg). That, however, does not translate into significantly better performance because the electric drivetrain will only give it 70 miles of range in Eco mode (113 km, less than on the base model). The top speed remains constant at 75 mph.

Ryvid launched the Outset to be the new entry-level bike in the portfolio, and that means it's a tad cheaper than its sibling. The asking price for this two-wheeler sits at $5,995, making it "one of the world's most affordable electric motorcycles, based on specification." The bike is available in just two colors, Sector Red and Vapor Grey, as opposed to the six colors available for the Anthem.

Remember how I said at the beginning of this piece that the Outset is a sort of two-in-one deal? That's because people can make their own Outsets if they like the ride so much.

All one has to do is own an Anthem motorcycle. Using a series of parts from the Ryvid catalog, as well as video tutorials provided by the company, owners can convert their existing rides into the new scrambler one, "at a fraction of the price of the complete machine." The process is reversible, making either of these two machines quite the sweet deal.

The company says the order books for the new electric motorcycle are already open, and plans to start shipping the Outsets in the summer of this year.

We'll keep an eye out for the new bike, both because you never know what celebrity may ride it for a music festival, but mostly because I can't wait to see what it can do on and off the road.