How Fast Is The Yamaha R1? A Look At Its Top Speed And Acceleration Times

The 2024 Yamaha R1 is one of the fastest sport bikes you can buy. The R1 competes with liter bikes such as the CBR1000RR, the Kawasaki Ninja ZX-10R, and the BMW S1000RR. And like those bikes, the R1 uses racetrack technology, but comes with a license plate, turn signals, and even a rear seat. Making power for the R1 is a 998cc inline four-cylinder engine, derived from their MotoGP engine. The R1 is the top dog in the Yamaha sport bike lineup, producing 197 hp and 83 lb-ft of torque – incredibly high for a bike that weighs just 443 pounds wet. 

It's worth taking a moment to appreciate just how much power that is. When you do the math, dividing the R1's weight by its power rating, you get a measurement of 1 hp per every 2.25 pounds. To put that into perspective, let's take an average car, let's say a Honda Accord, and do the same math. An Accord weighs 3,239 pounds in its lightest trim, and it puts out 192 horsepower — that means it has 1 hp per 16.86 pounds of the car's weight. To get to the same number as the R1 (1 hp per 2.25 pounds), the Accord would need 1,439 horses — an unrealistically high number for pretty much any passenger car. 

So what do these preposterously high numbers mean when it comes to outright speed? Like the horsepower rating, Yamaha doesn't publicly list the R1's top speed. Most sources, however, put it at a top speed of 186 miles per hour. That's the same top speed rating as several other liter bikes in the same class, and it comes down to something called the Gentleman's Agreement. In the 1990s, sport bike manufacturers were reaching for the stars, creating hyper-powerful motorcycles like the Suzuki Hayabusa and the Honda CBR1000XX Blackbird. But the bikes were getting too fast.

With nearly 200 horsepower on tap and such low curb weight numbers, motorcycles were on a path that could eventually lead to top speeds of over 200 miles per hour. Politicians and policymakers started taking notice, and a regulation on speed and power was on the horizon. Motorcycle manufacturers unofficially agreed on a speed cap of 186 mph (or just under 300 kph). There have been a few exceptions over the years, with some manufacturers ignoring the Gentleman's Agreement (the Aprillia RSV4, for example, has a top speed of 191 mph), but most super sport bikes stick to an electronically limited top speed of 186 mph.

Like horsepower and top speed, Yamaha doesn't currently list acceleration times on its consumer website. However, when MotorTrend tested the R1M back in 2019, it got some pretty incredible numbers. The R1M costs more than the standard R1, and it has several expensive bits of equipment like upgraded Öhlins suspension and carbon fiber bodywork, but it uses the same 998cc engine. That engine rocketed the R1M from zero to 60 mph in just 2.6 seconds during MotorTrend's tests. That's quicker than the vast majority of sports cars, and competitive with ultra-powerful supercars like the Porsche 911 GT3 RS (2.7 seconds to 60) and the McLaren Artura (2.6 seconds to 60). Once the R1M is up past 60, it makes it across the quarter-mile marker in just 9.8 seconds at 149 miles per hour.

Like the power figures, the R1's acceleration is worth putting into perspective. The all-electric Lucid Air Sapphire makes over 1,200 horsepower and is priced around $250,000. It's one of the quickest cars in the world, accelerating from zero to 60 mph in just 2.2 seconds, crossing the quarter-mile mark in 9.2 seconds at 157.1 miles per hour. With a price tag that starts at under $20k, the R1 is certainly slower than the Lucid, but it's also over $200,000 cheaper.