The Drawbacks of Monowheels: Why One Wheel Isn’t Always Better

Monowheels—vehicles built around a single, oversized wheel with the rider seated inside or on an inner frame—are eye-catching but come with significant disadvantages: difficult handling, safety risks (including “gerbiling”), weak braking and steering, poor practicality, complex maintenance, and uncertain legality. While they excel as showpieces or experimental platforms, they fall short as everyday transport.

What a Monowheel Is—and Why It’s Hard to Tame

A classic monowheel places the rider and drivetrain on a frame inside the rolling hoop. Steering typically relies on shifting weight and manipulating friction between inner rollers and the wheel, rather than a conventional fork and handlebars. That architecture creates unique drawbacks compared with bicycles, motorcycles, or even electric unicycles (which use active electronics to stabilize the rider on the outside of the wheel). Below are the key disadvantages owners, builders, and curious onlookers should understand.

Safety, Control, and Handling Limitations

The most consequential downsides relate to stability and control. The physics of an inner frame rotating within a single rolling hoop makes precise handling difficult and introduces failure modes uncommon in other vehicles.

• Risk of “gerbiling”: Under hard braking or sudden acceleration, the inner frame can rotate relative to the wheel, potentially carrying the rider up and over inside the hoop. This is a signature hazard of monowheels.
• Poor steering authority: With no steerable front wheel, directional changes rely on body weight shifts and differential friction. Steering response is slow, turning circles are large, and cambered roads can “pull” the machine.
• Braking compromises: One contact patch must handle all braking. Hard stops can trigger gerbiling, lengthen stopping distances, or cause loss of control, especially on low-grip surfaces.
• Side tipping at low speed: Without dynamic stabilization, monowheels are prone to lateral tip-over at walking speeds. Many builds need outriggers or considerable rider skill to prevent falls.
• Crosswind and surface sensitivity: High side area and a single track make them vulnerable to gusts, ruts, and road crown, increasing the chance of drift or wobble.
• High-speed instability: As speed rises, gyroscopic effects stiffen the system but can also introduce speed wobble and make course corrections sluggish.

These traits collectively reduce the safety margin, particularly in traffic or on imperfect surfaces, where quick, precise control is essential.

Practicality and Everyday Usability

Even when a rider masters the controls, the day-to-day realities of living with a monowheel present further obstacles.

• Limited payload and no passengers: Space and weight constraints leave little room for cargo; carrying a second rider is generally impractical.
• Awkward mounting and dismounting: Entering and exiting the inner frame can be clumsy, especially in tight spaces or on uneven ground.
• Visibility and conspicuity: The rider sits low and deep within the hoop on many designs, reducing forward visibility and making the vehicle harder for drivers to see.
• Comfort trade-offs: Vibration, heat from enclosed drivetrains, limited suspension options, and exposure to weather (unless heavily faired) make long rides tiring.
• Urban limitations: Kerbs, potholes, steep driveways, and tight corners are more challenging than on bicycles or motorcycles.

Taken together, these issues diminish the practicality of monowheels for commuting, errands, or mixed traffic environments.

Performance and Efficiency Constraints

Beyond control and comfort, performance is bounded by the single-wheel architecture and large rotating mass.

• Hill climbing and descending challenges: Uphill demands sustained torque and balance; downhill braking risks inner-frame rotation and overheating brakes.
• Speed ceilings: While some custom machines have reached noteworthy speeds on closed courses, stability, steering authority, and braking limits keep safe top speeds comparatively modest for everyday riding.
• Energy efficiency penalties: Large, heavy wheels increase rotational inertia and rolling resistance; steering by scrub wastes energy compared with articulated front wheels.

These constraints mean monowheels tend to be niche performers, excelling only in narrow, controlled scenarios rather than broad, real-world use.

Reliability, Maintenance, and Design Challenges

Monowheels concentrate stresses and components in unusual ways, complicating upkeep and reliability.

• Single point of failure: With one tire and one contact patch, a puncture or bearing issue immediately disables the vehicle.
• Complex driveline packaging: Engines, motors, fuel or batteries, and controls live inside the wheel, making access, cooling, and waterproofing more difficult.
• Custom tires and parts: Large-diameter rims and belts or rollers are often bespoke, raising costs and lead times for replacements.
• High bearing and alignment loads: Oversized, heavily loaded bearings and precise alignment are critical; misalignment accelerates wear and destabilizes handling.

The net effect is higher maintenance effort and expense compared with mainstream two-wheelers, with fewer off-the-shelf solutions.

Legal, Insurance, and Cost Considerations

Because monowheels are unusual and rarely mass-produced, owners face additional hurdles off the workshop floor.

• Regulatory ambiguity: In many jurisdictions, monowheels lack a clear vehicle category, complicating registration, road use, and safety compliance.
• Insurance difficulties: Insurers may refuse coverage or charge high premiums due to limited data and perceived risk.
• Build and ownership costs: Custom fabrication, unique parts, and low production volumes drive up acquisition and repair costs.

These non-technical barriers can be decisive, restricting monowheels to private land, events, or exhibitions rather than public roads.

When a Monowheel Still Makes Sense

Despite the drawbacks, there are contexts where the monowheel’s spectacle and simplicity are assets rather than liabilities.

• Shows, parades, and education: They are crowd-pleasers and effective for demonstrating mechanical principles.
• Record attempts and R&D: Closed-course speed runs and experimental engineering benefit from the format’s novelty.
• Art and maker culture: As kinetic sculptures or maker projects, monowheels offer creativity and craftsmanship challenges.

In these niches, limitations are manageable, and the unique form factor becomes the point rather than a compromise.

Monowheel vs. Electric Unicycle (EUC)

It’s useful to distinguish classic monowheels from modern electric unicycles, which place the rider atop the wheel and use sensors and control algorithms to balance.

• Active stabilization: EUCs self-balance fore-aft, reducing tip-over risk at low speed; classic monowheels do not.
• Steering and braking: EUCs offer more predictable control via electronics, though both platforms still rely on a single contact patch and are vulnerable on rough or slick surfaces.
• Practicality and legality: EUCs are lighter and more usable day-to-day but still face regulatory gray areas and require rider skill.

While EUCs mitigate several control issues, they don’t erase the fundamental one-wheel trade-offs in traction, redundancy, and road presence.

Summary

Monowheels are compelling to watch and build, but the same design that makes them captivating also makes them difficult to ride, hard to stop, and impractical in daily life. Safety risks like gerbiling, weak steering and braking, sensitivity to wind and road crown, limited comfort and cargo, complex maintenance, and legal uncertainty all stack against them. They shine as showpieces, experiments, and controlled-environment machines—not as mainstream transport.

Why did the monowheel fail?

It was not the most stable vehicle, could not carry more than one passenger in addition to the driver, and suffered from a number of other insurmountable design problems. As a fun piece of transportation history, however, nothing is more entertaining and fun than the motorized monowheel.

What are the disadvantages of a chainless bike?

Shaft Drive Bike Cons
Inefficient- Shaft drives are about 7% less efficient than chain drives. Compatibility- The only type of gearing you can use with a shaft drive is a geared hub or single speed. Derailleurs aren’t compatible. Weight- Shaft drives are 1-2 kg (2.2-2.4 pounds) heavier than chain or belt drives.

How hard is it to ride a monowheel?

Learning to ride a monowheel at higher speeds is a long, and often painful process. It’s nothing like riding a motorcycle and does not give the rider much control over the vehicle at all. Gentle inputs are key here: accelerating or decelerating too fast causes the frame to wildly rock back and forth.

Are monowheels street legal?

However, laws can vary widely by state and city. California: In California, Onewheels can be used on public roads provided the speed limit is below 35 mph, and riders are required to wear helmets if they are under 18 years old.