3 days of mountain passes and plenty of refuels, and a whole lot of opinions on the new suspension setup. I bought this bike as my personal weapon of the road, and what a weapon it turns out to be. Here's what the 2026 KTM 1390 Super Adventure S Evo gets right.
The setup
I picked up the KTM 1390 Super Adventure S Evo straight from the dealer and pointed it at the first mountain pass I could find on the map. No break-in babying, no gentle warm-up rides around the block — this bike needed to prove itself the same way I'd actually use it.
After a thousand kilometres of proper running-in, I entered the season's first Cannonball Bike Run — the Thomas edition — starting in Nancy, France and finishing in Strasbourg via three days through the Vosges. So this bike was in for a treat, and so was I — it needed to prove itself against the 1290 I'd previously owned.
It's the first flagship tourer I've ridden that doesn't feel like it's apologizing for its own weight.
On the road
The suspension is the headline here. Where the outgoing model felt harsh over broken tarmac, this generation soaks up frost heave and gravel-strewn hairpins without transmitting every pebble straight to your wrists. Standing on the pegs through a rough switchback, the chassis stayed composed in a way that made me trust it within the first twenty minutes. The turn-in was sharper too, and felt more purposeful than I expected — and I really enjoyed the throttle-stop downshifts and thumb-blipper upshifts, which brought a big smile to my face through the twistier switchback sections.
What impressed me
- Suspension that handles gravel and tarmac equally well without a single click of adjustment
- A seating position that didn't leave my lower back complaining after 300 km
- Throttle response smooth enough for greasy hairpins, punchy enough for the open valley roads
- The turn-in was sharper and more purposeful than the previous generation
Where it falls short
- The stock windscreen buffets above 130 km/h
- It's slightly more thirsty than the previous model, and it'll take some time to work out your average consumption from new
- Maps take a long time to download — plug your bike into a charger if you're downloading a batch of large maps
Verdict
If you split your riding between weekday commutes and weekend passes, this is the most convincing all-rounder I've tested this year. An absolute beast of an adventure bike, enough to give a sports tourer a run for its money — relaxing and sporty on the highway, but an absolute hooligan the moment the highway ends and the curves begin. So much midrange and comfort that you arrive fresh and invigorated, with a permanent grin at the end of every day.
