2025 KTM 390 Adventure First Ride Review: Should You Buy One?

Photography: Vaibhav Dhanawade

The 2025 KTM 390 Adventure’s throttle response is crisp, with sharp response, on tarmac or over the loose surface. And I was just beginning to get into the groove, leading the new 390 ADV dancing across the gravel trail when Sherman, our off-road ride curator, called out time! Oh, come on! After just a couple of hours trying to get to know the new 390 Adventure better, we were just beginning to match steps to start doing the tango! And poof! Already time to pack up and head back.

Also Read: 2025 KTM 390 Adventure, 390 Adventure X Launched

Riding back to base, through traffic, I kept thinking about what the new KTM 390 Adventure is all about. Light weight, with long travel suspension, a punchy engine with more power and torque than before, coupled with shorter gearing and a comprehensive electronics suite for a single-cylinder adventure bike – this ADV seems to have it all. Do they all come together to make it a tempting proposition, questions about KTM’s future notwithstanding? Those are some of the questions that played on my mind, and then some more.

Also Read: Bajaj Auto Approves 150 Million Euro Funding For KTM 

2025 KTM 390 Adventure: Design & Features

The 2025 KTM 390 Adventure's design is a complete departure from the previous generation KTM 390 Adventure. The new model’s aesthetics are inspired by KTM’s Dakar-winning 450 Rally and the front wears a tall-ish rally-type face, complete with vertically stacked headlights, tall windscreen and a high-mounted TFT console. The screen 5-inch bonded glass TFT screen offers good visibility, even under direct sunlight, and offers easy to use menus to navigate through the controls. Bluetooth connectivity, and the KTMConnect app offers linking your smartphone to the dash, enabling turn-by-turn navigation, phone calls and music streaming.

Three selectable ride modes are offered – Street, Rain and Off-Road, with Off-Road offering even more customisability in throttle maps, switchable traction control and Off-Road ABS. There’s a three-dimensional inertial measurement unit (IMU) that powers the lean-sensitive traction control and cornering ABS. Rain mode offers reduced throttle response and more intrusive traction control, but overall throttle response is same across the ride modes at engine speeds of over 5,500 rpm. For longer highway journeys, there’s a standard cruise control system.

According to KTM, the 2025 390 Adventure is the most off-road capable adventure bike in its segment. And to give it that capability, it comes with a 21-inch front wheel and 17-inch rear wheel combination (wire spoke) with KTM’s patented tubeless wheels. And the design of the wheels is unlike the cross-spoke tubeless rims that we see in many adventure motorcycles these days. 

There’s long-travel suspension, with a 43 mm WP APEX USD fork up front, adjustable for rebound and compression damping (30 clicks), with 200 mm stroke. At the rear as well, the WP APEX monoshock gets preload and rebound damping adjustability (20 clicks), with 205 mm travel. Seat height is 830 mm, but the profile of the seat is narrow up front, making it easy and convenient for me to place both feet firmly on terra firma. Anyone above 5’6” shouldn’t face any issues with the saddle height, unless one is not accustomed to tall-ish adventure bikes.  

Ground clearance is an impressive 237 mm, with a standard bash plate which should take care of protection over most off-road conditions, unless you’re inclined to go rock bashing or extreme enduro use. The bash plate, plastic knuckle guards, crash guard and sliders are all standard, so you don’t need to go shopping for basic protection. And talking of protection, the graphics on the bodywork are not stickers, but molded into the bodywork in several layers, to avoid scratches in case of any falls while riding off-road. 

Also Read: 2025 KTM 390 Adventure, 390 Adventure X Specifications Revealed

2025 KTM 390 Adventure: Engine & Performance

On the first afternoon of the 2025 KTM 390 Adventure press ride, we set out on a newly constructed highway, exploring the bike’s high-speed manners, as well as street dynamics. The idea was to get familiar with the bike’s ergonomics and controls, and to take some shots on tarmac and some details, before the sun set. In all, it was roughly about two hours’ time, not enough to shoot and evaluate a new motorcycle, but just about enough to skim the surface and get familiar. The next morning’s ride included a highway dash to our off-road location, a curated trail in Goa’s backyard, which included hard-packed rock, gravel as well as technical climbs up and down some trails. 

The new engine is all about tractability and performance. In numbers, the 399 cc, LC4c single-cylinder, liquid-cooled engine makes 45.3 bhp at 8500 rpm and 39 Nm of peak torque at 6500 rpm. And it’s about how the power and torque is delivered with the shorter gearing (with a 15-teeth front sprocket and 46-teeth rear sprocket), compared to the 15/45 sprocket sizes of the last-generation KTM 390 Adventure. The new 390 Adventure certainly has improved tractability at lower gears, and this is apparent while negotiating city traffic, out on the highway as well, and even over the loose stuff.

If the last-generation 390 Adventure had a somewhat peaky power delivery, where you always needed to have the engine on the boil, the new 390 Adventure’s excellent low-end tractability and mid-range grunt makes it pull cleanly from as low as 3,000 rpm. And shifting up through the six-speed gearbox (with a standard upshift quickshifter) will have you reach high triple digit speeds in no time. We saw a speedo-indicated maximum speed of over 150 kmph, and the dash from 80 to 100-130 kmph is urgent and quick, which should come in handy for overtakes on the highway. 

On the flip side, considering it’s a single-cylinder engine, the LC4c does feel buzzy, particularly around the footpegs at around 6,000 rpm, when you will be sitting at 100 kmph in top gear. But it’s not alarming, nor does it feel very rattly to really rob you of the engine’s performance and refinement. The biggest takeaway from the new 390 Adventure’s performance is its tractability and flexibility, in crawling speeds, out on the highway, and even when you do decide to venture off-road.

2025 KTM 390 Adventure: Ride & Handling

The WP suspension makes light work of soaking up all kinds of road undulations, and on tarmac it’s a comfortable place to be in, with the tall windscreen offering good protection from wind blast at high speed. Dynamics are pretty good too, and whether taking corners, or manoeuvring sweeping curves, the 390 Adventure remains stable, planted and confident. Brakes offer decent stopping power as well, although the long-travel suspension dives under hard braking. The sintered pads offer good bite, and even with the axially mounted ByBre calipers, the 320 mm front disc offers confident stopping power.

2025 KTM 390 Adventure: Off-Road Performance

Off the road is where the 2025 KTM 390 Adventure truly comes into its own. Our off-road experience included a ride across a gravel trail, over some hard-packed surfaces and some slightly technical climbs and downhill sections. Not even once did the new KTM 390 Adventure feel like a handful or incapable of tackling any of the obstacles or terrain that we introduced it to. Standing up ergonomics feel natural, and the throttle response is crisp and allows more control to slide in and out over loose terrain.

But this is where experienced riders will seek something more, and that is where the 390 Adventure feels like it needs something more, like a slightly taller seat, and higher-spec suspension to take on more challenging terrain. But even then, the standard KTM 390 Adventure its overall agility and impeccable off-road manners is an all-round impressive package that is deserves a long list of praises. 

2025 KTM 390 Adventure: Price & Value

The 2025 KTM 390 Adventure is priced at Rs. 3,67,699 (Ex-showroom) and is offered in just two dual-tone colour options, either orange with white components, or white with orange components. And considering the list of features, kit, performance and capability it comes with, its price to value proposition is difficult to ignore. In fact, it is possibly THE best adventure motorcycle you can think of right now, and not just in its segment, but also considering rivals a segment or two above it, with bigger engines boasting more performance and features. 

The 2025 KTM 390 Adventure offers a tempting proposition, one that will be difficult to beat, unless of course, the higher-spec KTM 390 Adventure R is launched in India, which will indeed make it an even more irresistible package in the sub-Rs. 5 lakh price bracket. And then there’s the other value proposition as well. With a made-in-India KTM, the new 390 Adventure will not be prohibitively expensive to own, and maintain, with service and spares costs being much more reasonable than any premium adventure bike. That makes it even more attractive in terms of the capability to value consideration.

2025 KTM 390 Adventure: Verdict

As a product, the 2025 KTM 390 Adventure makes an extremely strong case for anyone looking for an adventure bike to buy right now, without burning a hole in your pocket. With impressive highway manners, great tarmac dynamics and excellent off-road capability, the new KTM 390 Adventure is a versatile adventure touring motorcycle that ticks all the boxes to recommend it to anyone. 

What could be a nagging question for many is the future of KTM itself, but that is something KTM India says will be resolved soon, possibly by the end of February 2025. The question is not “if”, officials say, but “how” to go about getting the required investment to revive the iconic Austrian motorcycle brand. From all indications, Bajaj Auto will pump in the much-needed investment to get KTM back on the road, and to take on new adventures, in India, and around the world. 

For me though, a larger question remains. Timing is everything, and I recently let go of my big, heavy, multiple-cylinder, middleweight adventure bike. Is it the right time then to get something lighter, more practical, and go orange? Or will KTM India offer the 390 Adventure R for some of us, who still want more? Great bike, this 2025 KTM 390 Adventure, but yeh dil maange more!

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2025 KTM 390 Adventure Key Specifications: