I went to China to test drive Yadea’s electric scooters, e-bikes, and A LOT more!
I recently took a trip to China to visit Yadea’s sprawling Anhui factory, which is just one of the company’s eight worldwide manufacturing centers. Together, they produced over 16 million electric vehicles last year, more than all of the big electric car manufacturers combined.
Since these pint-sized electric vehicles are so massively popular, I wanted to go there and try them myself and see what all the fuss was about. As it turns out, there’s a good reason why these are the best-selling little EVs in the world! And now that several of the models are coming to Europe and North America, Yadea’s lineup is looking even more interesting.
This is Part II of this series, which follows my visit to the manufacturing facilities inside Yadea’s Anhui factory. To see how these e-bikes, e-scooters, e-three wheelers, and other popular micromobility vehicles are made, check out Part I of the series here.
If you’ve already checked it out (or you just want to jump right into the test drives), then keep on reading below. Or check out my video here, which covers both the factory tour and the test drives.
After finishing up the factory tour, where I had the chance to see how and where Yadea’s vehicles are produced, I was fortunate enough to spend the rest of the day test-driving many of the vehicles I had just watched rolling across the assembly line.
At the company’s test track, Yadea’s team prepared for me a lineup of electric mopeds, electric kickscooters, electric bicycles, and a couple really fun-looking electric three-wheelers.
I call it a test track, but I think a more accurate term would be torture track. The course starts with a dive into a shallow water pool to simulate riding through flooded roads (yes, what feels like it should be the grand finale is just the start!). A steep exit ramp from the standing water pool takes you across a washboard section simulating rutted-out roads. Then it’s uphill from there, literally, as a massive ramp takes you up and then back down the other side, launching you immediately into a cobblestone section. From there, you hit not just one but 26 speed bumps in rapid succession. It’s an HOA president’s fantasy come to life.
And if that wasn’t enough to cover just about every torturous terrain possible (and scramble your brain a bit from the few dozen speed bumps you just traversed), the course finishes off with a coup de grâce of a loose gravel section. It’s surely there to test the bikes’ abilities on gravel roads, but it’s so deep that it’s less like riding on a gravel road and more like riding on a gravel pit, so it also ends up being a test of your own riding skills.
Oh, and the entire scooter obstacle course is walled in by a fence, meaning once you’ve started, you aren’t getting back out until you’ve finished the course. Apparently, you either clear it or die trying.
I am proud to say that I completed the torture test on a couple of the electric mopeds as well as on their Cocoa electric utility bike, both of which were more than up to the task.
The moped climbed the ramp surprisingly quickly and then gave me a chance to test out the regenerative braking on the steep descent. On the descent I didn’t even need to touch the brake levers.
I declined to take the three-wheelers down the torture test course. Still, I saw multiple other Yadea three-wheelers run the gauntlet with Yadea employees at the helm since it’s part of the standard verification testing for vehicles to ensure they can handle such varied terrain. They were either braver than me, or they do this so many times a day that it’s a cakewalk for them at this point.
When it came time to test the standing scooters, I found three different full-suspension models laid out in front of me. The Yadea Artist was the lightest, yet still impressively powerful with a 600W motor. Two larger and progressively higher performance models, the Yadea Elite Max and Yadea Elite Prime, have even longer travel suspension, larger batteries, and faster speeds.
But they all still share many features like convenient folding designs, built-in handlebar turn signals that face both forwards and rearwards, and companion apps for more settings and control.
I was curious how well the scooters could handle the torture test, but wasn’t sure if I had the skills to make it myself. That’s when Joy, who comes from the scooter marketing division, volunteered to simultaneously emasculate me and show me how it was done. For reference, picture the adorable 90-lb-looking Joy flying down the course as she somehow sailed over that long gravel pit without a care in the world. Not wanting to lose face, I tried to recreate it afterward, yet I definitely had to put a foot down twice across the same gravel section. Looks like I’ll be taking off-road riding tips from Joy for now on.
Needing to save face, I told Joy I could surely tackle that massive ramp on the Elite Prime scooter. It’s the most powerful of the three full-suspension scooters, and perhaps worried about my safety, she showed me how to do it first. She flew up the ramp even more carefree than when she traversed the gravel pit, though I noticed she slowed near the top and put a foot down before leveling out.
Aha! My turn to show her up! I took the bars and went full speed into that ramp, hoping to finally win at something here. And as I shot up that massive ramp, I soon realized why she had pulled her punches at the end. The scooter is so powerful that I just kept going! I flew over the top of the ramp, continued across the tabletop, and headed down the other side before I managed to bring myself to a wide-eyed stop. Fortunately, no one saw my near launch into orbit as I was safely hidden on the far side of the ramp, giving me a chance to steady my heartbeat and ride back down as if everything had gone according to plan.
The takeaway point is this: these electric scooters can handle just about anything, but the real question is whether YOU can handle it.
The Cocoa electric utility bike was next on my list, and I instantly fell in love with the design. I like bright colors, and it’s cool to see the Yadea orange integrated into the racks, which are included as part of the bike and, fortunately, not held back behind a paywall as add-on accessories.
Yadea will also have several other accessories available in the future as they expand their line of cargo carriers, child seats, and other utility-oriented optional accessories. In the meantime, though, they’ve designed the bike to be fairly universal so that riders can either make their own add-ons or use third-party accessories as well.
The bike also rides beautifully, even without suspension. It’s got a huge, 5.5 inch color screen and offers a rear passenger bench option for carrying a second rider with you. I know many people won’t look at an e-bike without suspension, but I can tell you that the large tires helped it handle everything along the torture test quite well, at least until hitting the speed bump section too fast. That resulted in a rather rough ride, serving as a good reminder to slow down the next time you hit a series of 26 speed bumps in a row.
With a torque sensor, 7-speed drivetrain, and hydraulic disc brakes, the Yadea Cocoa has most of what most American riders are looking for. The 500W motor peaks at 740W, putting it near the upper limit for Class 2 e-bikes, even if it’s not exceeding the limit like many US-based electric bikes. It certainly felt plenty powerful to me, and I had no problem climbing the steep hill in the proving grounds’ torture test course.
The last vehicles to test were also the largest. Yadea had two of their three-wheelers set up for me to test. The first was the Yadea C16 electric trike, which comes in either a covered or open-top configuration. I tested the covered version, which felt essentially like a golf cart. It even started raining a bit, giving me the chance to test out the wipers on the windshield as well.
The motor is only listed as around 1,400 watts, but it’s weirdly powerful. Chinese companies often use the continuous power rating of the motor, while in the US we are used to local companies advertising the more impressive peak wattage. So don’t be fooled by the 1.4 kW rating, the true peak power of this thing is much higher. It was even quite powerful in reverse, so hill climbing in either direction won’t be a problem.
The front seat is basically meant for a single operator, though you could likely fit a small child on there with you. The rear has room for two healthy adults or perhaps three kids if they don’t bicker in close quarters.
The production quality is quite good, with everything having a cute and rounded, bubbly appearance. These types of vehicles are common for grandparents to use in China, often as a way to shuttle kids around or pick them up from daycare. The family-friendly design theme works well and is visible throughout the vehicle, giving it a higher level of approachability. It might look a bit foreign to us as Westerners, but I bet most people would see one on the street and want to give it a test ride – I certainly did!
The second three-wheeler I tested was the ET152 electric cargo tricycle, which is basically the pickup truck of China. These are hugely popular all over rural areas and are commonly seen both on farms for agricultural work, and on the shoulder of major roads in rural areas where they serve a utility role.
This one was loaded down with 15 jugs each carrying 25 liters of water, or around 55 pounds. That’s over 800 pounds of load, which it carried without even noticing since its actual payload capacity is actually 1.5 metric tons, or 3,300 pounds.
To kick things up a notch, I asked some of my new friends to go for a ride with me, getting six more humans worth of weight on the trike, but that barely even got us to half of its rated capacity. To put this into perspective, this electric cargo trike is rated to carry just as much load as an F-150 and more than many smaller pickup trucks in the US.
To put it lightly, I tested a pretty wide range of light electric vehicles at the Yadea factory, and that barely scratched the surface of the various models they offer.
I’m excited to see that more and more of the company’s lineup is starting to enter the European and North American markets. As the world’s largest electric vehicle maker, Yadea is well positioned to leverage its market leader position to combine technological innovations and high-quality manufacturing processes to bring some impressive new EVs to global markets.
As much fun as I had riding the vehicles on display, I can’t wait to see even more of Yadea’s offerings spread around the world.
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Are you wondering what kind of results you’d get if you added a home solar system to your roof? Homeowners are sharing their results online — and the real-world data might surprise you!
In a recent post to r/Solar, a Reddit user going by DontBuyBitcoin shared a screenshot indicating that their newly-installed ~11.5 kW system produced over 1,700 kWh of electricity in October. “Pretty surprised by the production of the system I got,” writes DontBuyBitcoin. “11.48KW. I cant wait to see what JUNE-AUGUST [2026] going to look like 😍 I wish SolarEdge will make their app better looking with more functionality”
Home solar energy chart
Other Redditors were quick to share in the enthusiasm. “Congratulations!!! Great numbers,” wrote LegalNet4337. “We got 1.6 MWh with a 14.45 kW system. East and West facing panels in SoCal.”
That 1,700 kWh is nothing to sneeze at. Based on the current national average electricity price of about $0.17/kWh (in AUG2025), DontBuyBitcoin’s admittedly large-ish system translates to ~$290 of potential savings. In a higher rate state like Illinois, with a projected 2026 kWh rate that’s closer to $0.18/kWh, that’s ~$306/mo.
We expect retail electricity prices to residential customers will average 17 cents per kilowatthour (kWh) nationwide in 2025, a 4% increase over 2024, and then rise to approximately 18 cents/kWh in 2026. This rise continues a trend in which residential electricity prices have increased at an average annual rate of 5% each year since the COVID-19 pandemic. The increase in retail electricity prices this year comes as the cost of natural gas to the electric power sector was up more than 40% in 1H25 compared with a year earlier, with similar year-over-year increases forecast for the remainder of 2025. The average cost of natural gas for power generation in our forecast increases another 17% in 2026.
Those are big numbers, but 11-15 kW rooftop solar systems are big. Significantly bigger, in fact, than the US average, ~6.6 kW in 2024 – but you don’t have to have a big system in order to post big numbers. Superior weather conditions and perfect PV panel placement can also get the job done, as another Redditor found.
“The last 2 days we have had perfect weather here in South Florida and I have been able to get over 30 kWh from a 5 kW system with a 3.8 kW inverter. This is the highest I have seen since getting PTO in September,” wrote Redditor dlewis23, who shared another SolarEdge graph. “I am super happy with seeing over 30 kWh in a single day.”
30 kW/day from home solar
Taken altogether, these real-world snapshots prove that whether it’s a modest 5 kW array or a beefy 10+ kW setup, homeowners out in the real world are seeing meaningful, measurable differences from their home solar installations. And, with retail electricity prices projected to keep on rising through the decade, every kilowatt counts.
Electrek’s Take
When we ran our “Why did you choose to go solar?” survey back in September, only 32.6% of respondents chose, “Lowering my monthly utility bills” as their primary motivation to go solar. That result proved, in my mind, that Electrek readers are just better people than most, and seem to be willing to spend a little more to do something positive for their environment and their community.
That said, wasn’t it no less a thinker than Albert Einstein who said, “Compound interest is the most powerful force in the universe” (Google it.)? And, with a 5% rate hike compounding every year from now until the AI and data center bubbles burst, the impact energy rates may have on all our pocketbooks may be enough to put “Lowering my monthly utility bills” back on top.
If and when that happens: be smart, get several quotes, and understand the difference between buying and leasing your PV system (especially if you plan on selling your home in the foreseeable future).
SOURCES: Reddit, EIA; featured image via Tesla.
If you’re considering going solar, it’s always a good idea to get quotes from a few installers. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.
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It seems like the writing was already on the wall last week when Volvo moved to make its Luminar-supplied LiDAR system an option – there are now reports that the Swedish car brand is set to ditch LiDAR tech entirely in 2026.
In a recent SEC filing following a missed interest payment on its 2L notes, Luminar confirmed that Volvo’s new ES90 and EX90 flagship models (along with the new Polestar 3) would no longer be offered with LiDAR from Luminar. The move signals a full reversal on the safety tech that had started as standard equipment, then became an option, and is now (according to reports from CarScoops) gone altogether.
In a statement, a Volvo Cars USA spokesperson added the decision was reportedly made, “to limit the company’s supply chain risk exposure, and it is a direct result of Luminar’s failure to meet its contractual obligations to Volvo Cars.”
This is what Luminar had to say about the current, icy state of the two companies’ relationship as of the 31OCT filing:
The Company’s largest customer, Volvo Cars (“Volvo”), has informed us that, beginning in April 2026, Volvo will no longer make our Iris LiDAR standard on its EX90 and ES90 vehicles (although Iris will remain an option). Volvo also informed the Company that it has deferred the decision as to whether to include LiDAR, including Halo (Luminar’s next generation LiDAR under development), in its next generation of vehicles from 2027 to 2029 at the earliest. As a result of these actions, the Company has made a claim against Volvo for significant damages and has suspended further commitments of Iris LiDAR products for Volvo pending resolution of the dispute. The Company is in discussions with Volvo concerning the dispute; however, there can be no assurance that the dispute will be resolved favorably or at all. Furthermore, there can be no guarantee that any claim or litigation against Volvo will be successful or that the Company will be able to recover damages from Volvo.
As a result of the foregoing, the Company is suspending its guidance for the fiscal year ending December 31, 2025.
On November 14, Luminar confirmed that Volvo had terminated its contract altogether, in a blow that could leave Luminar rethinking its long-term future and planning litigation against its biggest ex-customer.
The news follows a host of significant upgrades to the EX90 that include a new, more dependable electronic control module (ECM) and 800V system architecture for faster charging and upgraded ADAS that improves the automatic emergency steering functions and Park Pilot assistant.
Electrek’s Take
You can’t spend years telling everyone you’re miles ahead because you have LiDAR, then ditch LiDAR, and pretend no one is going to call you out on it. They had better hope they don’t up on Mark Rober’s YouTube channel doing a Wile E. Coyote impression (above).
That said, it’ll be interesting to see if ditching the LiDAR has a negative impact there. Or, frankly, whether ditching the LiDAR and its heavy compute loads will actually help mitigate some of the EX90’s niggling software issues. It could go either way, really – and I’m not quite sure which it will be. Let us know which way you think it’ll go in the comments.
SOURCE: Luminar, via SEC filing; featured image by Volvo.
If you’re considering going solar, it’s always a good idea to get quotes from a few installers. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.
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The new John Deere Z370RS Electric ZTrak zero turn electric riding mower promises all the power and performance Deere’s customers have come to expect from its quiet, maintenance-free electric offerings – but with an all new twist: removable batteries.
The latest residential ZT electric mower from John Deere features a 42″ AccelDeep mower deck for broad, capable cuts through up to 1.25 acres of lawn per charge, which is about what you’d expect from the current generation of battery-powered Deeres – but this is where the new Z370RS Electric ZTrak comes into its own.
Flip the lid behind the comfortably padded yellow seat and you’ll be greeted by six (6!) 56V ARC Lithium batteries from electric outdoor brand EGO. Those removable batteries can be swapped out of the Z370RS for fresh ones in seconds, getting you back to work in less time than it takes to gravity pour a tank of gas.
And, because they’re EGO batteries, they can be used in any 56V-powered EGO-brand tools and minibikes for unprecedented cross-brand interoperability. Tools and minibikes that, it should be noted, can be purchased at John Deere dealers across the country.
The upsell scripts write themselves, kids. And when you start your dialing, tell your prospective customers their new Z370RS Electric ZTrak electric mower lists for $6,499, and if you order now we can bundle it with EGO minibike for the kiddos – just in time for the holidays!
Electrek’s Take
When John Deere launched the first Z370R, Peter Johnson wrote that electrifying lawn equipment needs to be a priority, citing EPA data that showed gas-powered lawnmowers making up five percent of the total air pollution in the US (despite covering far less than 5% of the total miles driven on that gas). “Moreover,” he writes, “it takes about 800 million gallons of gasoline each year (with an additional 17 million gallons spilled) to fuel this equipment.”
It should go without saying, then, that states like California, which are banning small off-road combustion engines, have the right idea.
SOURCE | IMAGES: John Deere.
If you’re considering going solar, it’s always a good idea to get quotes from a few installers. To make sure you find a trusted, reliable solar installer near you that offers competitive pricing, check out EnergySage, a free service that makes it easy for you to go solar. It has hundreds of pre-vetted solar installers competing for your business, ensuring you get high-quality solutions and save 20-30% compared to going it alone. Plus, it’s free to use, and you won’t get sales calls until you select an installer and share your phone number with them.
Your personalized solar quotes are easy to compare online and you’ll get access to unbiased Energy Advisors to help you every step of the way. Get started here.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
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