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[Crissa]

All Zeros can be a lower-powered bike.  You can even go below Eco.

Electrics are well-behaved, they don't do weird things, and you can focus on technique instead of playing with gear and clutch.

-Crissa

[Shadow]

...
If this is your first motorcycle, I actually don't recommend starting with the DS (I initially how you could even ride it with no A2 license, but it turns out there's a loophole in the requirements -- it's a 59BHP bike). It's better to start on a lower-power bike -- unexciting is a feature, not a bug, where acceleration is concerned.

And also, NEVER buy a new bike as your first, regardless of the drivetrain type. You don't really know whether you'll enjoy motorcycling at all, or which kind of riding or bike you prefer, until you've ridden for a few months at the very least.
An electric bike least of all, since the changes in technology tend ot adversely affect resale value.
Buy used for a first bike.

2016 DSR was my first bike. It went well for three years / 60 000 km and I commuted on it every day in all weather. Any new EV is costly so you should plan to carry full insurance coverage, as any MVA damage to the battery and the vehicle is considered non-repairable. Overall I had a good experience with rides on the bike, and cost of ownership, really. Downsides for me were mostly that Zero Motorcycles had trouble building out their service network, so the repair-ability for small problems always was escalated into many weeks or months of downtime. We didn't have any source for parts then but now we have AF1Racing that will sell parts by mail. The other medium-range overland options compared to the Zero (and specifically for me the DSR) then were not EV motorcycles, so those were not options for me at all - I have no interest in small internal combustion engine maintenance. Since then Energica has proven to be a viable alternative to consider if you want an EV motorcycle, but also Alta Motors was disappeared by Harley-Davidson and nothing replaced it. In the smaller than motorcycle (yet bigger than eBike) category we also have gained Cake bikes and the Sur-Ron bikes. Regardless of size none of this stuff is cheap because battery technology is not cheap compared to the energy density of fossil fuels that are often compared to...

If you don't want the extra cost, don't care about the experience, or are otherwise limited by availability (for bikes, service, charging locations) then there's not some magic about the Zero DS that makes it a better or worse first new motorcycle. In any case as I learned there are always people driving cars and trying to murder you no matter what bike you ride 

[Crissa]

Electrics are also more resistant to slow-speed drops than gas engine bikes because of their lack of fluids.  You might bust a peg or a brake line, but you don't have oil and gas to spill or damage.  Electric bikes mostly don't care about being inverted.

-Crissa