E-bikes are expensive, in demand, and easy to resell. That makes them a target in a way your old hybrid never was.
The uncomfortable truth first: no lock is unbreakable. A determined thief with an angle grinder gets through almost anything in a couple of minutes. Locking well isn't about being impossible — it's about being slower, louder and more visible than the bike parked next to yours.
Buy a lock that's actually rated
Most of the locks sold next to bikes are jewellery. The cable lock that came free with something is a suggestion, and it opens with hand tools in seconds.
Look for an independent security rating rather than the manufacturer's own star system:
- Sold Secure (Gold, or the newer Diamond and Powered Cycle Gold ratings)
- ART (2 stars or above), common in the Netherlands
- Some insurers will only pay out if your lock carries one of these, so check your policy before you buy
Expect to spend real money. A rough guide people use is 10% of the bike's value — on a $2,000 e-bike, a $60 lock is not the place to save $40. A hardened steel U-lock or a heavy folding lock is the baseline. Chains are good but heavy; cables are decorative.
Lock it properly
Owning the right lock and using it badly is very common. The technique matters as much as the hardware.
- Lock the frame to something immovable. Not the wheel. A bike locked by its front wheel is a bike that leaves without its front wheel.
- Fill the space inside the U. Empty space is leverage, and leverage is how a lock gets popped. Get the shackle as full as possible with frame, wheel and rack.
- Check what you're locking to. Signposts you can lift the lock over, scaffolding, wooden fences and bolted-down racks are all "immovable" until they aren't. Give it a shake.
- Position the keyhole facing down and the lock body off the ground, so it's harder to attack and can't be smashed against the pavement.
- Use two locks of different types if the bike is staying anywhere for a while. A U-lock plus a chain means one tool doesn't defeat both, and thieves rarely carry both.
- Secure the wheels too. A second lock, or locking skewers instead of quick-releases.
Take the expensive removable bits with you
This is the e-bike-specific part.
Take the battery if it's removable and you'll be gone more than a few minutes. It's often the single most valuable component, it's designed to come off in seconds, and a bike without one is far less attractive to steal. It also stops anyone riding it away.
The same logic applies to the display or control unit on bikes where it detaches, and to lights, bags, and anything else that unclips.
Park it somewhere a theft would be awkward
Location does a lot of work here, and it's free.
Busy, well-lit, overlooked by windows or a camera, near a shop entrance where staff can see it. Thieves want privacy and time. A quiet alley behind a building gives them both; a rack outside a café window gives them neither.
Avoid leaving it in the same spot at the same time every day if you can help it. Patterns get noticed.
Indoors beats outdoors every time. If your workplace or building has any kind of secure room, use it even if it's mildly inconvenient.
Make it recoverable
Assume the worst happens and give yourself a chance:
- Photograph the whole bike, plus the serial number. It's usually stamped under the bottom bracket, sometimes on the head tube or rear dropout. Do this today, not after.
- Register it. National bike registries and, in some places, police-run schemes. A registered serial is what turns "someone has a bike like mine" into a recovery.
- Note the frame number separately from the bike. In your notes app, in your email to yourself, anywhere that isn't a photo you'll lose with your phone.
- Check your insurance. Home contents policies sometimes cover bikes away from the property, sometimes only up to a low limit, and often only with a rated lock. Worth reading before you need it.
- Use a tracker if you want. Hidden AirTag-style trackers in a seat tube or under a bottle cage have recovered plenty of bikes. Don't go confront a thief yourself — give the location to the police.
Group rides and coffee stops
The moment most bikes actually get stolen isn't the overnight lockup. It's the five minutes outside a café when nobody bothered.
At a rideout stop, park the bikes together where you can see them, and lock them to each other if nobody has a proper anchor. A pile of bikes cabled together is slow to separate and very visible to a group of riders sitting ten feet away. Somebody should be facing the window.
Five minutes is enough. It always is.
The realistic goal
You're not trying to make theft impossible. You're trying to make your bike the wrong bike to pick.
A rated lock, used properly, on a bike with no battery in it, parked somewhere overlooked — that's a bike a thief walks past on the way to the easier one. That's the whole game.