Jimmy took the Onewheel GT for a rented spin around Oahu, and the verdict is clear: more torque, more range, and hill climbing that no longer needs babying. The nose handle, brighter app controlled lights, and an optional treaded tire finally check off years of wishlist items. It's not a clean sweep though, a warning beep too quiet to hear and reports of DOA units and ghosting keep it from perfect, but for anyone cruising under 20 mph, it's a real step up from the XR.
Written Review
Every new Onewheel launch follows a familiar arc: excitement, a handful of early complaints and strong opinions, then the slow settling of consensus once people ride it over an extended period of time. The Onewheel GT is no exception, and Jimmy was able to spend a full session with Future Motion's flagship wheel to form his own opinion. After renting the GT through FriendWithA — a community rental marketplace that is essentially the Airbnb of gear — he put it through various tests on the streets and beaches of Oahu, Hawaii.
- How Jimmy rents Onewheels when he travels: https://friendwitha.com/?r=zqt8y
- Save $10 on your rental with code: Electric
What's New On The GT
Compared to the previous XR, the GT checks off a long list of requests Jimmy has been mentioning within reviews for years. A nose handle now sits alongside the side handle, the grip tape is noticeably grippier, and the front and rear footpads are now concave. The lights are significantly brighter and can be adjusted through a slider in the companion app, and they finally feel usable rather than decorative. Riders can also opt for a treaded tire, a harder compound built for durability over outright grip.
Ridden blind, without knowing what changed underneath, the GT still feels and rides like a Onewheel. What's different is that everything from under the hood specs, power, range, and torque feel turned up a notch.
Power and Confidence on Hawaiian Terrain
The clearest upgrade was hill climbing. On the XR, steep inclines meant babying the board, carving up the hill rather than riding straight through it. The GT powered up a challenging incline without stuttering or groaning, delivering what Jimmy described as smooth, confident torque the XR simply didn't have in reserve.
Hawaii's terrain supplied some unplanned stress tests. A patch of loose beach sand caused a brief stutter, but the GT powered through it, evidence Jimmy took as a sign an XR likely would have gone down in the same spot (his own words: a hypothesis, not a guarantee). A stray coconut shell also made an appearance as one of the island's more location specific hazards, alongside chicken droppings and unusually large snails on the trail, both of which Jimmy said make a strong case for riding with a fender — something the GT doesn't include standard.
Two Safety Nets: Pushback & The Beep
Future Motion built two separate systems into the GT to keep riders from overpowering the board: pushback, a physical resistance that kicks in near the board's limit, and an audible beep meant to warn riders before they get there. In practice, only one worked as intended.
Pushback engaged right around 19 miles per hour in Jimmy's speed test, with the board topping out at 19.9 before resistance took over. Across the lineup, he described the GT's pushback as stronger than the XR's but noticeably gentler than what riders feel on the Pint or Pint X. For anyone used to pushing an XR into the low 20s, that stronger pushback is a real adjustment, and maybe even be a dealbreaker.
The beep is a different story. Despite deliberately pushing the board toward its limit multiple times, Jimmy never reliably heard it activate, and even when he triggered it on camera, the sound was quiet enough that he questioned whether anyone riding at speed, wind in their ears, would ever actually hear it. Good concept, execution not there yet.
The Ghosting Question
Ghosting, when a Onewheel keeps moving after a rider steps off, has been one of the more serious complaints attached to this release, alongside a number of boards reportedly arriving dead on arrival. Jimmy hasn't personally run into either issue, but he ran an informal test that points toward a possible explanation. His four year old nephew, who has never been able to reliably activate a Pint, Pint X, or XR, hopped on the GT and got it going with no trouble at all. Jimmy's takeaway is that the new concave footpad is simply far more sensitive than on previous models, which would explain both why it's easier to trigger and why the board might be more prone to continuing to spin after a rider dismounts. He framed this as a working theory rather than a confirmed cause, and said he trusts Future Motion to resolve it, given how much the company has riding on the GT's reputation.
Everyday Livability
Because the GT's battery is too large to fly with, Jimmy rents locally whenever he's in Hawaii to visit family, which is also how this unit ended up with 130 miles on it before he ever touched it. That mileage turned out to be useful context for the treaded tire option: Future Motion's hard compound needs roughly 100 miles to break in, and by the time Jimmy rode it, it had settled into a tire he described as durable with a nice feel underfoot.
The GT also includes a charge limiting feature, letting riders cap charging at 90 percent through the app, a smart addition Jimmy flagged for anyone who lives at the top of a hill, since starting a descent on an electric board at full charge isn't the best idea.
Where The GT Falls Short
Beyond the beep, two other details kept the GT from a clean sweep. The light bar, excellent during the day, is bright enough at night to become near blinding in dark conditions. And the new side handle, while a welcome addition alongside the nose handle, rattles enough while riding that Jimmy called it out as noticeably clackety.
None of these are dealbreakers on their own, but combined with the dead on arrival and ghosting reports circulating around this release, they add up to a launch with more rough edges than Jimmy remembers seeing with the Pint, Pint X, or XR.
The Freshly Charged Verdict
If you already ride a Onewheel and stay under 20 miles per hour, which Jimmy considers the sensible cruising range for the platform anyway, the GT is a clear upgrade: more range, more torque, a genuinely usable light system, and hill climbing that no longer requires finesse. Riders coming from the XR who like to push into the low 20s should go in aware that the GT's stronger pushback is going to limit that experience. And for anyone weighing a rental before buying, especially somewhere like Hawaii where flying with a large battery isn't an option, FriendWithA remains a great way to test one before committing.
- How Jimmy rents Onewheels when he travels: https://friendwitha.com/?r=zqt8y
- Save $10 on your rental with code: Electric
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