I relished the simplicity of the sleek, stylish Quella Varsity Electric. If I lived somewhere flat I’d have loved it even more.
Men’s Fitness verdict
At first glance the Quella looks like a regular singlespeed bike, but under the hood there’s a responsive, reliable and feature-rich – not to mention stylish – electric machine.- Great design that looks stylish and doesn’t scream ‘e-bike’
- Simple and reliable operation
- Plenty of useful app feedback and great disabling feature
- Clever braking and recharging feature when you peddle backwards
- Upright riding position can feel a little twitchy
- Even with turbo power mode that single gear will struggle on most hills
Most electric bikes these days are very obviously electric. Large down-tube-mounted battery packs, bulbous bottom brackets housing electric motors and handlebar-mounted control panels all tend to scream ‘e-bike’. Not so the Quella Varsity Electric Bicycle. Despite being up there with some of the best electric bikes, due to its sleek, stylish and minimal design, it can easily be mistaken for a regular pedal bike. But there’s a lot more to Quella’s e-bike range than meets the eye.
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Quella Varsity Electric Bicycle design
The Quella Varsity Electric bike comes in four distinctly academia-inspired designs: the dark blue Oxford, the light blue Cambridge, the silver Imperial and the grey Edinburgh. Thanks to the steel-framed, single-speed design, the aptly named Varsity wouldn’t look out of place on the cobbled streets of any of these university cities. Each coloured bike shares an identical spec, and each can be bought in the bull-horn handlebar ‘Courier’ model or the more upright riser-bar ‘Classic’ variety. My light blue Cambridge came with riser bars, which I’ve always found better for handling.
The main reason the Varsity could pass itself off as a regular bike is that the motor and battery are both housed inside the rear hub. There’s no control panel either; instead the bike’s three motor-assist modes – eco, turbo and turbo custom – can all be controlled from the companion Zehus app on your phone.
The 4130 chromo steel Quella Varsity Electric comes in four frame sizes: 51cm, 54cm, 58cm and 61cm. The smallest two sizes weight 13.9kg fully built; the larger two weigh 15.2kg. It’s a simple and light enough design that I was able to take it up two flights of stairs to store it without working up a sweat.
The design is rounded out by deep-rimmed wheels, v-brakes, CNC cranks, geo comfort saddle and vegan-friendly leather bar tape.
Quella Varsity Electric Bicycle features
Though it’s hidden away in the 3.2kg rear hub, the standout feature of the Varsity Electric is its 250W Zehus motor, giving pedal assist up to the legal limit of 15.5mph/25kmph. So far, so unremarkable. However, it’s the ability to control and customise the amount of pedal assist with your phone that makes the Quella Varsity Electric really stand out. There’s a phone holder on the bars which I found to be more secure than it looks. Or you can leave your phone at home, in which case the motor ‘remembers’ the last mode you were in and reverts to that.
The Zehus app also allows you to immobilise the motor, making it extremely difficult for thieves to pedal it away. And in the event of a theft, the in-build GPS will help Quella track the bike down on your behalf.
The motor and battery have two clever tricks up their sleeves. If you pedal backwards, not only does it apply the equivalent of engine braking; it also charges the battery mid-ride. Doing this regularly throughout a ride will allow you to eke out more than the stated 60km range of a fully charged battery.
Quella Varsity Electric Bicycle performance
I cycled the Quella Varsity Electric around the rolling lanes near my home in Somerset, as well as the flatter city streets of Bath and Bristol. Admittedly the former is not really the playground the Varsity is designed for, yet I found it coped surprisingly well. The main issue, of course, was the fact that the bike only has one gear, a fairly standard 44:16 that’s great for urban cruising but less so for grinding up 10% inclines. Boost mode and risers bars certainly help when the gradients start to rise, but they’re no substitute for dropping into easier gears.
On my city explorations I would easily get 60km a day on a full charge in eco mode – sometimes up to 5km more with regular back-pedalling. I found boost mode would cut this to about 40-45km, and hillier routes would reduce this a little further. The app handily tells you how far you’ve ridden so you don’t need to record your rides elsewhere – unless, of course, you want to delve further into your data.
Even the charging port on this stealthy e-bike is difficult to find; unusually it’s hidden away in the rear axle. A light on the hub clearly shows you when it’s charging – a full charge from empty took around two and a half hours.
Quella Varsity Electric Bicycle verdict
The Quella Varsity is a hugely enjoyable bike to ride and much of its charm is down to the fact that, due to the simplicity of its design and operation, you often forget you’re riding an e-bike. You can just pedal away for hours in eco mode, enjoying moderate pedal assist all the way. When you get to your destination you don’t have to switch it off or detach the battery for charging; just park it and forget it. The next time you wheel it out you be in the same mode you left it in. You can choose to control it on the fly with your phone or keep it in one mode.
Of course having a battery built into the hub means you have to lug the whole bike to your nearest charging point. But Quella says some its customers buy a spare (non-motorised) rear wheel so they can occasionally switch to a lighter, non-powered ride (you can switch the motor off on your phone, but you won’t get the weight advantage. It’s definitely a bike built for urban cruising and I found it doesn’t like sharp cornering too much – occasionally it can feel a bit twitchy.
That and its one gear are small sacrifices to make for a sleek-looking electric machine with classic styling, that’s bound to turn heads. It’s not a bike for riding through rolling terrain. If you try, its limitations will be painfully obvious. But for cruising or commuting through towns and cities, the Quella Varsity Electric will look – and feel – right at home. It’s well designed and well built, and from my experience offers excellent performance and value for money too.
Quella Varsity Electric Bicycle tech specs
| Frame material | 4130 chromoly |
| Colors | Light blue, dark blue, silver, grey |
| Sizes | 51cm, 54cm, 58cm, 61cm |
| Pedal assist modes | Eco, Boost, Custom Boost |
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