Excellent ride quality, comfortable ergonomics, impressive tech
Relaxed performance, underwhelming styling
There is something quite deliberate about the Ather Konarc. If you spend a little time with it, you’ll realise immediately that it’s not chasing the quickest acceleration figures, the sportiest handling or that familiar electric shove that has become almost mandatory for premium EVs. Instead, the Konarc seems to have asked a much simpler question: what if an electric scooter was just really, really good at being a scooter?
That sounds obvious, but it's actually quite a departure for Ather. The company has built its reputation around the performance-oriented 450, while the Rizta took the brand into family-scooter territory. The Konarc sits somewhere in between, but its priorities are very clearly different. Having spent some time riding it, comfort, refinement and ease of use seem to be the three things Ather really wants you to notice. And the first one becomes obvious within a few metres.
The Konarc's ride quality is probably my favourite thing about it. Indian roads are rarely kind to scooters, and the Konarc seems to have been engineered with exactly that in mind. It gets 90mm of front suspension travel and 100mm at the rear, and the long-travel setup does a fantastic job of dealing with broken surfaces. Potholes, sharp edges and generally rubbish patches of tarmac are dispatched with very little fuss. There is a plushness to the ride that you don't always associate with scooters, particularly ones from a manufacturer that has historically put so much emphasis on sporty dynamics.
The 14-inch front wheel helps too. It gives the Konarc a sense of stability over rough surfaces and makes it feel more planted when the road gets messy. There's also a long 1,352mm wheelbase and a relatively relaxed rake angle, both of which contribute to that settled character. The Konarc never feel nervous or twitchy.
The second thing that stood out to me is refinement. The Konarc is incredibly quiet. It's noticeably quieter than both the Rizta and the 450X, and around town that makes a surprisingly big difference. There's very little drivetrain noise and the power delivery is smooth enough that the scooter feels almost serene when you're simply cruising through traffic.
Ather uses a sequential gear-drive transmission, which has been engineered for smooth and near-silent power delivery. Whatever the technical explanation, the result is something that feels properly polished. It's easy to underestimate how much this matters. Electric scooters are already quieter than their petrol counterparts, but mechanical noise, tyre noise and various other little sounds can still make them feel busy. The Konarc doesn't. It feels like Ather has made a conscious effort to remove the background noise from the experience.
That brings us to the first thing I'm less convinced by: performance. The S 125 and S 161 variants produce 4.7kW and 16Nm, with a claimed 0- 40 km/h time of 4.7 seconds. On paper, those numbers are perfectly adequate for an urban scooter. But on the road, the Konarc feels quite relaxed.
Even in Power mode, there isn't much of that instant EV shove you might expect. It gets moving immediately after you twist the throttle, but there's no great surge of torque that pins you back into the seat. For some buyers, that won't matter at all. In fact, it's probably exactly what they want. But if you're coming to the Konarc expecting the punchy character of an Ather 450, you're going to be slightly surprised.
Where it does impress is handling. The Konarc can weigh as much as 129kg, but it doesn't feel like a heavy scooter. At low speeds, it's easy to manoeuvre and easy to place in traffic. U-turns, tight gaps and parking manoeuvres don't require you to wrestle with it. The riding position deserves credit as well. It's comfortable and natural, and combined with that plush suspension, it makes the Konarc a scooter that you could spend a fair amount of time on without getting tired of it.
The handling isn't sporty in the 450X sense, but that's not a criticism. It feels stable, predictable and easy to live with. A little too anonymous The other thing I'm not entirely sold on is the styling. This is subjective, of course, but the Konarc doesn't really stand out.
The design is clean, with Ather's familiar lighting signatures, crafted surfaces and dual-tone treatment, but I find it fairly restrained. Compared with the more distinctive 450X, there's considerably less visual drama here. That could, of course, be exactly what mainstream buyers want.But if you're looking for something that turns heads, this probably isn't it.
There's one more thing worth talking about, and that's range. During my time with the Konarc, I spent a fair amount of it in Power mode. Over one 28.1km stint, the range estimate dropped by 39km.
Now, that isn't a full range test, and it shouldn't be treated as one. Ather's claimed TrueRange figure is measured in SmartEco mode, so riding around in Power mode and extrapolating that result to the scooter's actual range would be misleading. But it does tell you something useful: ride the Konarc aggressively and the efficiency takes a hit. That's hardly unique to electric scooters, but it's worth keeping in mind if you intend to exploit whatever performance the scooter has rather than potter around in its more efficient modes.
Ather has also spent considerable effort making the Konarc easier to live with. There's MagicKey, which lets you wake and unlock the scooter without taking the key out of your pocket, while also allowing you to locate the scooter and open the seat remotely. AutoPop opens the seat and holds it upright, making access to the under-seat storage considerably easier when your hands are full.
Then there's AirWalk, which uses the motor to provide a small amount of assistance when you're manually pushing or pulling the scooter. These aren't features that make for spectacular launch-stage demonstrations, but they're the sort of things you appreciate after living with a scooter for months. The same goes for charging and servicing. The Konarc gets an onboard charger, while an optional 450W offboard charger can work alongside the built-in 450W unit to deliver 900W combined charging. Ather has also doubled the service interval to 10,000km, which should mean roughly one visit a year for most riders.
There is, however, one fairly important caveat to this review. I haven't ridden the Z variant. The Konarc will eventually be available in two product lines, with the Z getting 125km and 161km IDC range options. That version is due sometime next year, so there is potentially another side to the Konarc that we haven't experienced yet. For now, then, these impressions apply to the S variant I've ridden. And honestly, that seems fitting because the S is the version that makes the Konarc's philosophy clearest.
The Konarc isn't the most exciting Ather I've ridden. It isn't particularly torquey, and the styling won't have everyone turning around to look at it. But those aren't really the things it seems to care about.
What it does exceptionally well is make everyday riding easy. The ride quality is excellent. The 14-inch front wheel and long-travel suspension deal with our roads brilliantly. It's easy to handle despite its weight, the riding position is good, and the refinement is genuinely impressive. In fact, the sheer quietness of the drivetrain might be one of its most underrated qualities.
