【Epoch Times, December 5, 2025】Starting from December 1st, the sale of electric bicycles adhering to the original national standard will be completely banned nationwide in China, replaced by a series of new models known as the “new national standard.” This policy has sparked widespread controversy, including issues such as “no carrying children on the back seat,” “emergency braking from speeding,” and “hard seat material,” resulting in poor sales.
After December 1st, all electric pedal-assist bicycle products sold in mainland China must comply with the newly revised mandatory national standard “Technical Specifications for Electric Bicycle Safety.”
The new standard mandates that electric bicycles operate at a speed slower than regular bicycles, with a uniform speed limit of 25 kilometers per hour. At the same time, the feature allowing for carrying passengers and cargo, a characteristic of the old models, has been removed. Although the new regulations allow for carrying children under 12 years old (in some regions even up to 16 years old), manufacturers have generally chosen to eliminate the back seat to comply with regulations on overall vehicle weight and restrictions on plastic parts.
For busy mothers who rely on electric bikes to shuttle children and shop daily, this has become a practical challenge. Netizens mockingly suggest laying children down or having them ride piggyback on their mothers.
Apart from the carrying capacity issue, the user experience of the new bikes has also been criticized: comfortable foam seats have been replaced with hard foam material, with some users reporting that the seat on certain models cannot be fixed and easily comes out if pulled up. Some joke that in the future, they’ll have to worry not only about their helmets being stolen but also about their seats being taken.
While the addition of Beidou positioning and increased use of metal components in the new bikes may seem to enhance safety, the design flaw of the 25 kilometers per hour speed limit and the feature shutting off power for overspeeding have brought new safety risks. Accidents have been reported where the vehicle cut off power briefly while going uphill, causing the vehicle to rear-end others. Many users question whether a sudden power cut leading to rear-end collisions and falls isn’t a greater risk when the braking distance from 25 kilometers per hour is 4 meters and 6 meters from 35 kilometers per hour.
A mainland Chinese blogger analyzed three points of contention: first, the new national standard mandates a speed limit of 25 km/h, which is deemed too slow, especially for commuters. Riding along, you may find elderly cyclists on shared bikes easily overtaking you. Second, the new national standard requires electric bikes to have pedals. However, many manufacturers’ pedal design is such that they are more for show than actual use – they grind shoes with each step, can’t rotate properly, or are plainly non-functional. Everyone understands that these features are just for passing the inspection. Third, non-compliant vehicles that need to be phased out have left many old electric bike owners, who’ve used their vehicles well for years, suddenly labeled as “non-compliant”: either they must be registered, scrapped within a deadline, or have additional components installed. In summary, a bunch of scrap metal that serves no purpose.
The online community heavily criticizes the official introduction of the new national standard for electric bicycles:
“Is this a solution proposed after a brainstorming session? Now you know what it means to stimulate domestic demand, right? If there are several family members working, regardless of whether they work in the same place or not, each person needs a bike. Domestic demand has arrived. Every day, they fuss over these useless things. I heard it’s to make everyone buy a bike.”
A widely-praised comment on NetEase reads: “A group of car drivers providing guidance to electric bike users has raised a lot of opinions.”
Many express their thoughts straightforwardly: if they don’t want people to ride electric bikes, they should just say so, rather than causing chaos with new national standards.
According to The Paper, many electric pedal-assist bicycle stores in regions like Shanghai and Zhuzhou, Hunan, have yet to stock the new national standard bicycles as they are expected to be difficult to sell, leading to low penetration rates. A responsible person from a brand store mentioned that due to inadequate supply from manufacturers for the new national standard bikes, shop owners worry that the bikes may stagnate in the market due to higher prices.
The China Bicycle Association stated on the 4th that over 70% of the new standard products developed by companies already feature a back seat, catering to the needs of parent-child travels, with only a few models designed for single riders not incorporating a back seat. Consumers can independently choose a model with the features they require.
The association also mentioned that reports of “tin seats” being used are only seen in a few companies that failed to fully consider the riders’ comfort, highlighting that this is not a widespread practice in the industry.
In the evening of December 4th, an official from the Consumer Goods Industry Department of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of the Chinese Communist Party also acknowledged that certain companies had not sufficiently understood or accurately interpreted the new standards during implementation, especially in terms of not fully considering consumers’ actual needs in the product design, leading to an unsatisfactory user experience. They emphasized that this situation is not a common occurrence in the industry.
Mainland netizens question: “Which department oversees the approval of these plans and quality inspections? Is it solely the manufacturers’ responsibility?” The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology is speaking in official tones. Proper research suggests that setting the maximum speed limit for electric bicycles at 45 kilometers is reasonable.
On a foreign platform, netizens express their discontent, stating, “The legislative power is not in the hands of the people in China; the Communist Party can spout nonsense as they please.” The introduction of the new national standard for electric bikes fully demonstrates that Chinese experts and bureaucratic elites are enemies of the people, exploiting the populace, catering to capital interests, and being devious dogs! Don’t harbor illusions that they will work for the benefit of the people!