The front derailleur is under attack from multiple angles. In the mountain bike world, SRAM aggressively sought to kill it off, and eventually, rear cassettes offered enough range that they won the fight.
Things remain murkier in the drop-bar game. The front derailleur is slowly losing favourability on gravel as gearing ranges with 1x grow, as does demand for more tyre clearance that losing the front derailleur can help afford, plus the general simplicity of 1x is advantageous. For road, 1x gearing has niche interest for its aerodynamic benefits and, in some cases, more efficient running through larger cogs.
Still, it’s hard to deny that 2x front-shifting benefits certain applications. It’s an efficient way to achieve a wide gearing range. It offers a quick jump between two very different gear ratios. The humble front derailleur also means we don’t need the weight of dinner-plate-sized rear sprockets, the wide gear jumps they bring, or the lengthy derailleur cages required to use them.
So what if you could combine the benefits of 2x front shifting with the simplicity of 1x? That’s exactly what Classified sought to do with its Powershift two-speed rear hub that meshes with your choice of 11, 12 or 13-speed rear derailleur. After nearly three years in the market, this stealthy product is gaining some traction.
At Escape Collective, Ronan Mc Laughlin and I have used the Classified system extensively across road and gravel bikes. So how does it work? What are the downsides? And who’s it for? All of this and more in this detailed review.
Good stuff: Works incredibly well with lightning-fast and ultra-reliable shifting; impressive compatibility and ease of fitment.
Bad stuff: Separate shifter button feels like an add-on; heavier than a premium 2x gearing setup; cost; potential minor efficiency loss in the easy gear; bearings are not user-serviceable.
Classified, in a hubshell
Founded by engineering brains with experience in automotive transmissions, Belgium-based Classified launched in 2020 with its Powershift hub system. This hub system is intended for road and gravel bikes, and is the focus of this review. It’s also worth noting that Classified recently released a subtly modified version for mountain bike purposes, and surely has plans to expand the product range from there.
While not the first with such a concept, Classified’s Powershift system combines an internally geared hub with a traditional rear derailleur and cassette. The road and gravel version will only fit common 142 x 12 thru-axle and disc-equipped bikes, while the newer mountain bike version only fits 148 x 12 Boost spacing.
The hub is designed to work with existing drivetrains from the major manufacturers. Here, the hub requires Classified’s own 11, 12 or 13-speed cassette to be matched with your preferred shifters, rear derailleur, chain, crankset, and disc-brake system. There is quite a lot of scope for gearing customisation, firstly with your choice of chainring size, and secondly with the cassette size you choose from Classified.
Built into a sealed unit around the rear hub axle, Classified’s planetary gear system (aka epicyclic) conceals two gears. There’s the direct-drive 1:1 gear which sees the six spur-style planet gears locked out and therefore operating like a regular bicycle hub with a gearing ratio matched to the front chainring. Shift the system, and the planetary gears are unlocked to produce a 1:0.686 gear (for brevity, I’ll reference this as the .7 gear), something that’s designed to approximate the gear jump equivalent to the smaller ring on a regular 2x crankset.
For example, engaging Classified’s planetary gear will turn a 46-tooth chainring into an effective 32T. A 52-tooth chainring is then geared equivalently to a 36T. And a 50T becomes a 34T.
The ratio difference best replicates the 16-tooth jump of Shimano’s 2x road cranks. And in this scenario, you can run a single chainring equal in size to your preferred road big ring along with a matching cassette size, and retain all the same ratios.
Meanwhile, gear ranges tend to be wider on the latest gravel bike groupsets from Shimano, SRAM, and Campagnolo. I’ve been running the Classified system on a gravel bike with an 11-34T cassette and a 46T chainring. Including the two-speed Powershift, this provides a 451% range. By comparison, this personal bike was previously equipped with Shimano GRX in a 1x11 configuration using a 42T chainring and 11-46T cassette that afforded a 418% gear range. Meanwhile, you could compare it against a Shimano GRX 800-series drivetrain in a 2x configuration with an 11-34T cassette and 48/31T chainrings that provides a broader 479% total range.
Want more range? Classified recently released an 11-40T cassette for 12-speed users. This provides a whopping 531% range that’s even wider than SRAM’s Eagle ‘Mullet” 520% offerings (10-52T cassette), and the Classified achieves that wider range while offering closer steps between the cassette cogs.
The hub switches between the two gears with Classified’s own wireless shifter that lasts over a year on its small coin battery (CR1632). The wireless receiver, along with a Micro-USB rechargeable battery that lasts between 3-6 months of riding between charges, is built into the handle of Classified’s own rear thru-axle for an impressively clean and easy setup. The thru-axle (receiver) and shifter (transmitter) are the only electrical components; the Powershift unit itself is entirely mechanical.
As you may expect, the Powershift hub is unlike anything else. The axle, bearings, planetary gear system, and freehub all sit as a single integrated – and not-user-serviceable – unit that’s claimed to be maintenance-free (I’ll come back to this!). That unit is then affixed into Classified’s open-bore hub shell with a common cassette lockring tool. Such a modular design means you can own multiple different Classified-compatible wheelsets and only one Classified Powershift system, or in the event of servicing, you can merely send back the sealed unit and not the whole wheel.
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