It’s that time of year again – new models, tweaked models, or just a different paint job – they’ll all be on show next week at Motorcycle Live in Birmingham.
Honda has revealed a host of subtle changes to its range of adventurey bikes, from the little and hugely competent CRF300 that has essentially been around since 2012, through the relatively new CL500 to the tweaked 750 Transalp, Africa Twin and even the heavyweight NT1100.
It’s interesting to note that after the madness of the ‘sportsbike’ era and the race to produce the quickest and most complicated bikes imaginable, there’s a refreshing realisation that simplicity and reliability is what many of us want. Hence the CRF300L, which started life in the 1970s as the XL250S and was reintroduced in 2012 as the CRF250L before getting that displacement boost in 2021. Honda make great play of the fact that it’s light (142kgs), nimble, reliable and huge fun to use, so they’ve only really changed the lights, improved the cooling a little and introduced a new colourway for 2025. Of course the ‘Honda red’ remains, but for next year there’ll also be grey, with red and white graphics.
The CRF300 Rally so beloved of overlanders, with its bigger (almost 13 litres) fuel tank and 11kgs more weight, gets the same LED headlamp and indicator upgrades and similar ‘thermal’ improvement (in part through bodywork changes), but remains available in only red paint.
Also harking back to the ’70s is the much more recently introduced CL500. The CL badge was given to the uber-cool single and twin-cylinder small capacity street scrambler bikes that sold so well in California while here in Britain we were choosing CB/CD road bikes.
This new CL500, which looks really great with its twin shocks and signature high-level exhaust, is the latest from the 500 parallel twin stable which brought us the CB500X. The CL has an A2-suitable 47hp and a host of available accessories to help you style your dream, like handguards and high front mudguard, taller, flatter seat and throwover panniers.
At 192kgs and with cast wheels it’s much more of a styling exercise than rugged street-scrambler, though with shorter, closer gearing than the 500X it’ll be a giggle to use. Until we test it we won’t know if that gearing has much of an impact on range afforded by the little 12 litre tank, but Honda claim the CL will achieve 300kms.
Colours are to be the very retro metallic yellow and black, and the more questionable matt green and matt brown…
The street oriented, but still much under-rated NC750X, receives new bodywork with a much closer family resemblance to the VFR-engined 800 Crossrunner of a decade ago. New colours include a fetching green. After enjoying over 40,000 miles on the editorial NC I remain amazed more of these bikes aren’t being used for overland trips. They just don’t seem to have captured the attention in the way that CB500Xs have.
The famous ‘Transalp’ name was only reintroduced in 2023 as a 750 single cam twin, and updates for 2025 focus on bodywork tweaks – headlight and screen mainly – and new electronica, like the 5″ TFT screen. The Transalp may have name and graphics of old, but here Honda have gone some distance from the reliable simplicity of thos early 600 and 650 models. There are 5 riding modes to switch between, 2 ABS settings and a host of acronyms governing everything from throttle control to exhaust.
Anyway, get yourself along to Motorcycle Live and you can see all the models. Honda, with their DCT automatic models and every size and complexity of machine possible (including a new V3 concept with electrical compressor) is bound to have something that’ll take you Round The World or Round The Block if you’re thinking of getting out there.
