I am looking to buy a first scooter for my daughter, who is just learning to ride. She is around 4 ft 10 inches tall, and her expected monthly running will be approximately 300 km. We are open to both electric and petrol scooters. Could you please suggest the best options that are easy to handle, comfortable for shorter riders, and safe for beginners?

Autocar India

•25m

Currently, the electric bike market in India has very limited options under the Rs. 2 lakh mark and even among those, none of them have proven to be compelling alternatives to ICE motorcycles. We'd strongly recommend you consider an electric scooter instead because it will give you the benefits of an EV like low running costs and the comfort of home charging while bringing in practical features like a large underseat storage area. Specifically, options like the TVS iQube, Ather Rizta, Bajaj Chetak and Vida VX2 should be at the top of your shopping list. Take test rides of each and pick a variant with the battery capacity which suits your daily use case and also covers unexpected occurrences.

Autocar India

•2d

A cruiser will be more manageable for your shorter stature but a roadster (like the RE Hunter 350 and Triumph Speed 400) will be a more capable and comfortable bike. Aside from the RE Meteor 350, there's really no mainstream small capacity cruiser worth considering under Rs 3 lakh. If you want to switch to a roadster, we'd recommend the TVS Ronin because that bike has a low seat height and is still comfortable with its neutral ergonomics and light kerb weight. The 350cc Triumph Speed 400 will be the quickest and most dynamically capable of all three machines listed above. The RE Hunter 350 is a very good all-rounder as long as you have no sporting intentions. A test ride will help you decide whether you're ready to make the switch from a cruiser to a more conventional machine or not.

Autocar India

•6d

Since your priority is road riding and you like to cover more than 1,000 km in a day on your travels, we'd recommend you look at machines like the Honda NX500 and Kawasaki Versys 650. Both offer very good seating comfort, wind protection and smooth twin-cylinder engines that can comfortably sustain triple-digit cruising speeds without intrusive vibrations. While they may look like adventure bikes, both are much more road-focused in the way they ride and behave. They can handle bad roads if needed, but they are not hardcore off-road machines.If you want something that's a little more road-focused and sporty, then the Kawasaki Ninja 650 is also a good option. It has a smooth engine and is very capable at highway cruising speeds, though it will not be as comfortable over very long distances as the NX500 or Versys 650. You will also need to be mindful of the low ground clearance and the expensive alloy wheels over bad roads.Depending on the sort of bike you prefer, make your decision, and before doing so, take a test ride of all three to figure out which one is right for you.