I’ve been using the Wahoo ACE head unit for about 8 months now and I have quite a few things to add to our initial review that Ronan did back when it was first launched in December, 2024. I won’t consider this a ‘review’ but I have quite a bit to add from my own experience that I thought I’d jot down informally.
The initial reviews for the ACE weren’t overly positive, but most indicated that it’s a promising device once the bugs are worked out and features are launched.
The reason I wanted to post this is because while it’s not perfect, the large size is fantastic for my limited use case. In particular:
I need reading glasses (*sigh) and I love not needing to use them to see all the fields that I want to see. It’s certainly huge and heavy (nearly the size of an iphone - see photo below) and I wouldn’t use it in a race, but for general riding it’s terrific. Also, when it’s on the bike, it doesn’t look nearly as big as you might think.
Large maps are fantastic for the reason above, and also it makes it easier to use. I wish there was a way to send a route from Google maps to the unit though. I could be wrong, but on the Wahoo app there’s no ‘take me to’ that the ELEMNT app had for routing (maybe I just can’t find it? But that wasn’t overly reliable anyway)
When I have an outdoor training session to do, the larger screen size makes it easy to see what I need to do, easy to use (skip to the next/previous interval, see the relevant fields, etc)
Battery life is fantastic. They claim 30hrs, but I haven’t pushed it to this limit yet. It’s one less thing I need to think about with all the other stuff I need to charge on my bike these days. I might charge it once every couple weeks.
There’s a screen that I can control my music or podcasts from, instead of needing to take it out my phone. That said, it’s fairly buggy (sometimes doesn’t show up, doesn’t always sync properly between what’s actually being played compared to what’s shown)
All of these things above make it a huge upgrade for me from my ROAM that I used previously. Now, I haven’t used a Garmin in years so I don’t know how this compares.
Now, some of the things that I don’t like:
It uses Wahoo app instead of ELEMNT companion app that I use for all my other wahoo devices. The Wahoo app has a bunch of features and services that I don’t have much interest in that they’re trying to sell me.
There are still some annoying s/w bugs - my screens keep on changing fields for example. For example, my Workout profile screen will show completely different fields that I configured it to. This is extremely annoying.
The Wind sensor is totally useless to me. It was a novilty at first, but I get rid of it now. It would have been much more useful to simply let me know which way the wind is blowing (like the WindField app for Garmins)
I don’t use the bike bell feature, and even while intentionally looking for it I haven’t even found how to activate it. I accidentally used it once, but don’t know how I did it. I supposed I could look this up, but you’d think it would be more intuitive.
The touch screen sensitivity isn’t great. Thank goodness there’s hard buttons. Getting to the setting screen always takes me about 5 swipes to activate it.
Mounting - why didn’t they just put the attachment on the underside of the head unit further back to allow for legacy mounts to accept it? Instead they put it right in the middle such taht all my bikes need a new mount now (which I’m not going to invest in)
Would I pay US$600 / CA$850 / €600 / £550 / AU$1,000 for it? If I needed a new head unit, probably. (Disclosure: Wahoo sent me this test unit to keep)
Keen to hear anyone else’s thoughts and experiences on the ACE.
Agreed. I can’t speak for other people’s use cases, but I don’t really need a bell on a road or MTB bike, and on my gravel bike where I’ll sometimes use the bike paths I just simply put a $10 bell on!
Lucky you if you can actually still read fields without your glasses!
I use the biggest Garmins so I can get bigger maps but I still can’t read anything these days without my bifocal or $$$$$ multifocal glasses. sigh. As someone who used to have 20-20 vision, this really bugs me. ;-(
I got round the annoying mount issue by sitting a Ravemen front light on the bike mount, raises the ace unit up so the bottom sits slightly above the bar. An added safety feature too I guess. I do like the bungy cord tether too!
After the initial “this is big” factor, the ACE has been fine for me. I do like the bigger screen even though I have 20/20 vision. I remember going from Bolt V1 to Roam V2 was a revelation and definitely couldn’t go back to a Bolt sized computer. I could probably go back to a Roam but have no reason to get the V3 at the moment. I haven’t really encountered screen visibility issues to me, but I’m also not really relying on the screen or map a lot as I don’t need any navigation in the area I am. The only time I’ve had issue is if the sun is in direct reflection, which I’d expect issues for other screens in that case.
Wind sensor quickly lost its novelty to confirm what I was feeling.
My biggest issue is getting stuck on the loading screen sometimes. I have to force power off or I just turn on my Roam V2 and go.
I rarely have to charge the thing too! Also having a 1 year old probably has something to do with reducing my riding time
I feel uncomfortable with the idea of a bike computer costing that much. I pay attention to numbers and data too, but are we that deep in the matrix now?
Just confirming that my initial comment was an overall comment, not attacking/challenging you @kuotient .
I’m also aware there are people with specific needs/requirements, who a product like this, at this price, is almost critical to their participation in cycling.
I think the wind sensor on the Ace has the potential to be very useful, if Wahoo did the right things with app support. Absent that support it could still be useful but probably a fair bit of hassle unless you were motivated, or desperate.
)
.