Canyon Citylite:ON

The Canyon Citylite:ON is described as ‘lightweight and easy to carry’ and for ‘comfortable everyday city riding’. There’s plenty of power from the Bosch Performance Line mid-drive, transmitted via a belt drive and five hub gears and it all comes at a competitive price of £2,799. Alas, for many people, the bike’s appeal will be negated by a poorly placed and even worse performing integrated light on the handlebars.

This is a great pity as the spec looks great on paper and even after testing hundreds of e-bikes I was genuinely looking forward to this one and writing what I expected to be an effusive review. The Performance Line motor is one of our favourites here at ebiketips as it offers plenty of smooth power without the extra cost generally associated with Bosch’s top of the range Performance Line CX, and this 2025-updated version didn’t disappoint.

It’s paired with a removable 400Wh battery that’s neatly integrated into the downtube and a sleek looking Purion 200 display.   

It wasn’t just the fully accessorised spec list – including hardwired lights, full length mudguards, chainguard, kickstand, rear wheel lock and suspension seatpost – that caught my eye, but the fact that load hauling is detailed too – something often lacking on e-bike spec sheets, even if it is actually possible to fit extra carrying kit.

Canyon Citylite:ON, by Richard Peace

The bike can be fitted with an optional 10kg MIK front rack and comes with a 27kg rated MIK HD compatible rear rack as standard (the HD part of the acronym means it is approved for use with child seats). More than this though, it was the fact that Canyon specifically mentions the Citylite:ON has a, “trailer hitch interface with up to 60kg carrying capacity”. Combine that with the rack ratings and that’s a truly impressive hauling setup. 
 

The bike

There are two frame options with the Citylite:ON model, straightforwardly described as step-through and stepover, and I tested the latter. They are both one-size frames recommended for riders 155-180cm and 165-195 cm respectively.

Canyon’s quoted weights state the step-over variant is around half a kilogram heavier (21.94kg vs 21.46kg). I weighed my test bike at 23.3kg, though that included the weight of the optional front rack which came ready fitted. Around 2kg of that weight is the removable 400Wh battery. All in all, this is pretty respectable for a fully-equipped city bike with hub gears. Careful design of the alu-alloy frame and use of a carbon fork no doubt help keep the weight to this respectable level.

Note the total payload rating of the bike – which Canyon states is rider plus cargo, including any trailer load – is 118kg. This means you can’t actually load up all racks and a trailer to the maximum rating (unless you happen to weigh 21kg). 

We’ve always loved the Bosch Performance Line mid-drive and the upated 2025 version is 400g lighter than its predecessor at 2.8kg. Unlike other Bosch mid-drives, which gained increased torque and power in the 2025 upgrade, the Performance Line retains its 75Nm and 600W – though the power level parameters are now customisable via the app. It still delivers impressive performance though, as we’ll come to in the ‘Ride’ section below – especially so given this isn’t even Bosch’s top spec motor. 

The 400Wh battery drops out of the bottom of the downtube and is unlocked using the same key you use on the rear wheel lock. As long as the rear wheel lock remains open, the key remains in the lock and cannot be pulled out or fall out whilst riding – a neat system for ensuring you always have your battery key with you. The battery can be charged on or off the bike. 

The neat looking Bosch Purion 200 handlebar control combines power buttons and a colour display.

Other elements of the Citylite:ON are high quality, as you might expect. There is a maintenance-lite CDC belt drive, Shimano Nexus 5-speed internal geared hub, Promax DC946F hydraulic disc brakes, a suspension seatpost, solid looking metal mudguards, an Atran Velo Edge HV kickstand, a frame lock and a water bottle cage mount on the downtube.

Whilst the Sate-lite M15 rear light is fantastic, the handlebar encapsulated Supernova Starstream Mini is the one element of the bike I took real exception to. During my first ride in a busy city centre, I could immediately see it was blinding oncomers. Having loosened the four bolts on the handlebar clamp to move it down a little, I only got about ten feet of illuminated road in front of me. In my eyes, it’s simply an awful piece of design and makes the bike difficult to use safely at night on unlit roads at speed. What’s more, if you mount a front basket and put a load of gear in it, the light is completely obscured.

It appears to be a daytime running light, so the only option is to point it right down at the ground and, if you want good illumination at night, fit a separate light with its own batteries.   
 

The ride

Despite the svelte looks of the Citylite:ON, it rides rather like a Dutch town bike in that the tall front end gives you a heads-up view of everything around you, which is just what you want in urban areas.

Handling is predictably reassuring, helped by large volume tyres and perfectly responsive power from the motor. My only gripe was that over humps and bumps – the likes of small potholes and cobbles – the frame transmits quite a lot of jarring to the rider. This is despite the presence of those tyres and a rather stiffly-sprung suspension seatpost – though dropping the tyre pressure a little would undoubtedly have helped.  

Power is buttery smooth and beautifully responsive to pedal pressure as long as you are in approximately the right gear. I found there was plenty of power available up just about all gradients. The only time the bike slowed significantly was up my ultra-steep hill test of around 25% – though with a lower gear progress here would have been even easier.

There’s little noise from the motor in most conditions and the four power modes are nicely graduated and easy to shift between using the Purion 200 by your left hand. It’s also a decent motor if you want to ride without power on the flat. If you had only a handful of miles over easy terrain to ride after emptying the battery, it shouldn’t be too much of an ask for a rider with basic fitness.   

Winter weather and steep gradients really take their toll on battery range so it wasn’t surprising I came nowhere near Canyon’s claims of around 50 miles range for the 400Wh battery. I estimated typical range to be around 25 miles over hilly Pennine territory in cold and damp conditions. You would get more on flatter terrain in warmer weather. Nevertheless, if that suggests too meagre a range for your purposes, there is always the option of purchasing Bosch’s optional 250Wh PowerMore range extender. 

Shifting of the five Shimano Nexus hub gears is pretty good, but with the occasional clunk or small delay, though this may have just been the gear teeth and cables wearing in. I would have much preferred a rotary shifter over the trigger shifters provided, as the former allows much quicker shifting through several gears at once. 

I haven’t used the MIK luggage system that much, but if the supplied front basket is anything to go by, it’s a high quality system that is a breeze to use with the various attachments on offer clicking on and off in a matter of seconds. The only downside is that you will need to pay extra for their bespoke nature and given the impressive quality of the system, extra bags, boxes and child seats are not likely to be cheap. 

A word on towing: Canyon endorses Croozer trailers as being compatible, but any solid axle mounting system should at least have a good chance of fitting. (If trailer mount compatability is a deal breaker, do try to get to a Canyon dealer with a CityliteON in stock to test with your trailer mount, just to be sure.) Even if you have a QR axle trailer mount system, that doesn’t rule it out as converters are available for many brands. 
 

How smart is the Smart System?

Bosch is clearly investing a lot of time and money into the Smart System which the Citylite:ON is compatible with. There are a lot of features available once you pair Bosch’s eBike Flow app via the Purion display (I found this a quick and easy process). As is often the case with such digital embellishments there’s a mass of stats and info on offer – more than most people will ever need.

There are three broad areas where the app potentially gives you more control. Adjustment of the power delivery from your motor; navigation, including mapping; and security, via an inbuilt alarm and GPS tracking.  

I used the app largely to tweak the power levels – after all, navigation and security functions are widely available from third party providers (e.g. Komoot and Powunity respectively to give just a couple of examples). Of the four power levels (Eco, Tour, Auto and Turbo), Auto is probably the most useful in hilly country. It claims to be automatic, which it seems to be to a degree, but don’t expect it to switch the power off totally – it still gives some power downhill or on the flat. It’s roughly analogous to the eMTB mode I tried on the MMR X-Bolt electric mountain bike and throttles power back a bit when conditions are less stressful for it.

In practice, I found the Purion 200 display provided more than enough info and never felt the need to have the app open on my phone and mounted on the bars. The Purion 200 is a mini masterpiece of design and functionality. The only downside was that at 30% battery capacity the display locks in to a warning screen which stops you looking at other data screens.

In summary, I’d say the Smart System was nice to have but certainly not essential. 

Canyon says: “If the standard frame lock doesn’t give you enough peace of mind, you can boost theft protection with the Bosch ConnectModule, which costs an additional €130. This enables GPS tracking and a motor lock via the Flow app, and can be installed either by your dealer or as a DIY upgrade.” You can use an extra Kiox display to enable electronic locking of the motor via the phone app, but this appears an expensive and messy solution.

There are other upgrade options such as 3D mapping, which also requires you to subscribe to Bosch services, but again this seems to be unecessarily adding an extra layer of operational complication, not to mention expense.  

If you want to use the app whilst riding, Canyon provides a standard SP Connect mount on the top of the stem and there is even an optional wireless charging adaptor in Canyon’s accessory shop that simply clicks onto the SP Connect mount, though I assume your phone would need induction charging built into it.  
 

Value and competitors

It’s a real pity that the headlight was such a big issue for me on this bike – otherwise the high quality of all components and the very positive ride experience of this elegant and relatively light e-bike would have made it highly recommendable – despite the fact it’s quite heavy on power consumption and a little rigid to ride over bumpy ground. Nevertheless, if you can live with that front light, I would still recommend it. 

The standout competition is the Mako Shark (£2,300) which ticked a lot of boxes for a low maintenance, multi-geared e-bike. Other options include Cube’s Supreme Hybrid range, which has belt drive options that certainly give the Mako a run for its money – though they will likely cost a few hundred pounds more. Raleigh’s Motus Tour Ltd, meanwhile, is currently going for only £1,365, but is chain driven and features the less powerful Bosch Active Line Plus motor. And if you really fancy stepless transmission and don’t need tons of hill climbing power take a look at Tenways’ AGO T (£2,499).

canyon.com

All the deals displayed on our review pages are pulled from a constantly updating database feed of the best affiliate deals available. The criteria for deciding on what are the best deals is who is offering the lowest, delivered price. In most cases we will be showing the very best deal available online, but sometimes you may be able to find an item cheaper. If you can please feel free to post a link in the comments box below. To find out more about affiliate links on road.cc click here.