The 750-Watt Line: Why DJI’s Avinox Has to Dumb Itself Down Just to Race

PUBLISHED BY RADICAL LIFE STUDIOS / MTB REPORT

At the Bosch eMTB Challenge in Whistler this August, riders hit confusion right at the start line and behind it sits a question that reaches way past one race and lands squarely on American trails: how much motor is too much? The UCI’s answer is 750 watts. And that number should sound familiar to anyone who has read up on U.S. e-bike law.

The rule

Since 2026, every UCI-sanctioned e-MTB race runs on a new motor-homologation system, known as EPAC, with one hard ceiling: 750 watts of mechanical power at the rear wheel. Only seven drive units have cleared testing so far, Aksoll, Avinox, Bosch, Polini, Shimano, Specialized and SRAM. Not on the list, not on the start line.

Avinox’s problem

DJI’s Avinox has been the disruptor of the last two years, the Nokia-to-iPhone moment for e-bike motors. The current M2S puts out 1,500 watts of peak power and 150 Nm of torque. That is double the UCI limit. To race at all, Avinox built a dedicated version, the M2S Race750, firmware-detuned to 750 watts, no hardware change, just a software leash. Only then did it make the UCI list. Before that, it was locked out, including at the 2025 World Championships in Valais.

Avinox builds a 1,500-watt motor — then has to cut it in half in software just to line up.

Here’s the American twist

This is where it gets pointed for U.S. riders. 750 watts is not just a UCI number, it is the federal power ceiling the whole Class 1, 2 and 3 e-bike framework is built on. Which means a stock Avinox, at 1,500 watts, puts out twice the legal limit for a Class 1 e-bike on most American trails.

Land managers, the USFS, and IMBA-aligned access advocates have spent years fighting to keep e-MTBs welcome on shared trails, largely on the promise that a Class 1 e-bike is a modest, pedal-assist machine, not a moped. A motor sold at 2x that number, even if most owners never break a single law with it, hands the “e-bikes are basically motorcycles” crowd exactly the ammunition they have been looking for. That is why the UCI’s 750-watt line matters well beyond racing: it is the one number in this entire arms race that lines up with what U.S. trail access is actually built on.

And Bosch runs the series

Worth sitting with: the race series is the Bosch eMTB Challenge, put on by the market’s incumbent. Bosch’s current Performance Line CX-R sits right at 750 watts. So the newcomer has to throttle hard while the established player conveniently lands right on the line that became the rule. Make of that what you will.

What it means for you

If you own an Avinox bike, relax, nothing about your trail rig changes. The detune is a race-only thing, and your stock motor stays exactly as powerful as the day you bought it. But if you care about where you are allowed to ride, the power numbers are worth watching. Every jump up the wattage chart is another talking point for the people who would rather see e-MTBs pushed off the trails entirely.

The community is split. Some figure a detuned Avinox wins anyway, that is how good the tuning is. Others think e-bike racing is a corporate invention nobody asked for. And plenty land on the sensible middle: if the best motor on the market is still the best when you turn it down, maybe a cap is not the enemy. For now, the rulebook, not the market, is the thing showing restraint. In a sport that usually chases bigger numbers, that is a strange and welcome plot twist.

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