Royal Enfield Scram 411: The term “scrambler” has been thrown around liberally in recent years, often indicating nothing more than cosmetic tweaks to existing roadsters.
Rather than taking a road bike and adding off-road styling cues, the Scram 411 begins with a purpose-built adventure platform and selectively modifies it for urban and light off-road use.
“We weren’t looking at doing another retro-inspired scrambler,” says Royal Enfield CEO Siddhartha Lal.
“The Scram was born as a motorcycle that would feel at home in the jungle of the city, and still has the ability to escape the city limits when the chance presents.
While you pay lip-service to understanding this philosophy, it comes through in the way that the Himalayan formula has been sensibly modified.
The biggest change is to the front wheel, which has gone from 21 inches to a much more street-friendly 19, helping to tighten up the motorcycle’s geometry for faster steering response while keeping it just capable of clearing some obstacles.
Front suspension travel is decreased from 200mm to 190mm, providing a more comfortable ride over city obstacles and more manageable handling on paved roads.
Royal Enfield Scram 411: Aesthetics with Purpose
There’s more than just color schemes behind the visual distinction of the Scram, however. The signature front rack and windscreen of the Himalayan vanish, giving a cleaner, more purposeful front end.
This also includes a new look single-piece seat replacing the stepped dual unit, allowing for better rider mobility around town and maintaining all-day comfort.
The refigured side panels and tank shrouds give the bike a more compact aesthetic, but the 2024 Emptory shares the same architecture as its adventure-oriented sibling.
The colorways are especially worth mentioning, as they diverge dramatically from the more muted palette typically found on Royal Enfield models.
The playful palettes — including the high-visibility Blazing Yellow and Skyline Blue — are a simple rebuttal to the idea that serious motorcycles have to wear serious colors.
Instead, they rejoice in the Scram’s more whimsical, expressive nature while keeping it from blending in in urban settings.
“The colors are not only for aesthetics,” says the industrial designer Vidya Pratap, who requested anonymity for this article.
“They speak to the character of the motorcycle less utilitarian than the Himalayan but never without character,” he said. “You can use it purposefully as opposed to just being fashionable.”
The Familiar Heart
Underneath the updated styling is the same air-cooled 411cc single-cylinder engine as in the Himalayan, with a measured 24.3 horsepower at 6,500 RPM and a total of 32 Nm of torque at 4,250 RPM.
These modest numbers are not telling the whole story of the engine’s character in the real world — it’s not total output that matters but how this power is delivered.
But the powerband is longer-stroked, prioritizing readily available torque across the rev range, and the mass of the rotating engine flywheel gives it a cadence that leads you to a different state of riding than most new motorcycles.
This leisurely dissemination of power complements the Scram’s urban inquisitor ethos perfectly, offering just enough grunt for farcical thoracic interactions without requiring that you check in on the tachometer every 4 seconds.
Gears are well-spaced in the five-speed transmission; first is low for close maneuvering, but fifth is tall enough so that cruising a whisk below 100 kph is done with the engine settling into a pleasant thrum felt as well as heard, a refined ready-wheat ergonmatic aspect Royal Enfield customers used to love.
Adventure DNA for Urban Performance
The Scram excels in tackling the pitfalls of aging urban infrastructure. Long-travel suspension dispatches potholes that would disconcert most roadsters with aplomb.
The upright riding position gives you great sightlines in traffic, and the narrow overall width allows for confident filtering between cars as congestion inevitably builds.
A 795mm seat height — 15mm lower than its rival Himalayan — lowers the seat and makes it more accessible to riders of average stature but doesn’t affect ground clearance which retains a generous 200mm.
This makes the Scram able to roll over urban hazards that would require its conventional street motorcycle cousins to perform avoidance maneuvers.
Braking performance finds a practical compromise—the 300mm front disc (twin-piston floating caliper) and 240mm rear (single-piston caliper) offer enough stopping force without being overbearing, while dual-channel ABS could be partially hacked for off-road usage.
“You feel the Himalayan DNA most when you hit the kind of rough patches that would have you wincing on other urban motorcycles,” says Rahul Mishra, a Mumbai-based owner.
“It just floats over broken roads with this unflappable composure that completely transforms how you experience the city.
Beyond the Urban Jungle
Where more road-focused, aggressive dual-sport bikes feel right at home on the tarmac, the Scram is still surprisingly capable when the road bonk$ out.
Fire roads, gravel tracks, and even moderately challenging trails are well within its comfort zone, as long as the rider recognizes the limitations of that 19-inch front wheel and street-biased tire patterns.
Seating position works for standing or sitting operation, and the skinnier tank junction makes it easier to shift weight for light off-road work.
The engine’s tractable nature comes in handy here, as it serves up a predictable amount of power that’s easy to modulate on loose surfaces.
But the Scram sensibly doesn’t pretend to have the Himalayan’s greater off-road aptitude. The shortened front suspension travel, unique wheel size and lack of the front rack (which doubles as the Himalayan’s crash protection) all suggest this is a bike that thrives on detours more than adventure riding, and technical terrain is best left to its more specialized cousin.
Market Position and Identity
With a sticker price hovering 5-10% lower than the high Alpine-hugging Himalayan, depending on local market, the Scram is seen as an easier entry into the adventure-themed branch of Royal Enfield’s motorcycle family tree.
And this pricing strategy recognizes that many would-be purchasers are living in environments where they’d only rarely see the Himalayan’s ultimate potential, so it essentially offered up a more useful alternative while sacrificing none of the basic character that makes these motorcycles special.
The Scram therefore faces competition from traditional scramblers such as the Ducati Scrambler Sixty2 or Triumph Scrambler 900, but also stands up against urban oriented adventure motorcycles such as the BMW G310GS and KTM 390 Adventure.
Gravel-focused rides that are less hardcore than purpose-built adventure bikes, yet more adept than scrambler variants designed to boast style over substance, make for a beguiling proposition for anyone seeking true versatility over playing the field in a given genre of motorcycle.
Royal Enfield Scram 411: A Thoughtful Evolution
The Scram 411 is a rare bird in the motorcycle industry, a discerning evolution of an existing platform that results in a genuinely different riding experience, not just a marketing differentiation.
In reimagining the Himalayan as a mainly urban motorcycle, while retaining its basic versatility, Royal Enfield has produced a motorcycle that is more relevant to the way many riders actually use their bikes, rather than how they dream of using them.
In so doing, they’ve shown that the scrambler concept can allow for an authentic interpretation that reaches beyond styling exercises—a motorcycle that scrambles not only between road and dirt but between reliable motorcycle genres to produce something that is actually useful for real-world riding.
