Harley-Davidson 2023 Lineup Revealed!

Harley-Davidson have unveiled their full 2023 lineup, including 9 awesome looking new models, some of which help to celebrate their 120th anniversary. Read on for everything that you need to know about them.

CVO Road Glide Limited Image from Harley-Davidson

120th MODELS: CVO Road Glide Limited

The headline act of the anniversary models is the CVO Road Glide Limited which Harley describe as having “one of the most intricate paint schemes ever offered…to celebrate 120 years of craftsmanship.”

It really is pretty full on, including “a bright red pinstripe” and “the head and wings of a soaring eagle.” I wouldn't describe this one as stealthy or subtle, but that's not really the point. This is for the dedicated Harley enthusiast, a celebration of the company's history, and in that regard it hits the mark and stands out against the standard Road Glide as something that looks pretty special.

1,500 will be made worldwide and you'll get the serial number laser etched into a panel on the tank. I expect these to go pretty quickly, despite the £50,395 price tag. But it's a proper Harley collectors item and we've seen limited runs of bikes like this sell out quickly many times before.

OTHER ANNIVERSARY MODELS

If you do miss out, fear not as there are 6 other models getting an anniversary treatment. Each of them gets a special paint job that's inspired by early Harley-Davidsons, all with Heirloom Red as their base colour. Plus they all get a bright red pinstripe, crimson fade, the eagle tank medallion, a seat cover with the red side panels and gold embroidered Harley logo, and some red fade powertrain inserts.

In price order: the Fat Boy comes in at £27,895 and there'll be 3,000 of those, £28,295 gets you the Heritage Classic at 1,700 units, for £32,995 you've got the Street Glide Special and Road Glide Special, both of which will be 1,600 made each, at £35,495 you've got the Ultra Limited with 1,300 made, and then if you fancy a trike there's the Tri Glide Ultra at £51,495 with 1,100 made.

Personally I think that Ultra Limited is the pick of the bunch. A little more chilled out in the finish than the CVO Road Glide Limited, but still looking a bit more special. The Heritage has always looked good to me too - I like the classic styling. Let me know which you'd pick down in the comments below!

FREEWHEELER (From £31,495)

As well as the Anniversary editions, we've got a few more new arrivals, starting with the updated Freewheeler cruiser-style trike. It still gets the big 114ci version of the Milwaukee 8 engine with all that torque it delivers, still got the same chassis, bodywork with the rear trunk, and a nice suite of rider aids including cornering specific linked braking, ABS, TC, and drag-torque slip control.But for the new model year it's got a new finish and it looks way more mean and aggressive. Previous iterations had the fairly bright looking chrome finish on all the hardware, but this one is fully blacked out on the engine and components which I think improves it massively. And also the new 18 inch wheels instead of the 15 inchers on the previous gen, plus the new front wheel design, I think combine for another big visual boost.

BREAKOUT (From £24,195)

Also getting a fresh new look is the Breakout, along with some performance and practicality improvements. Primarily, it gets a bump in capacity with the 114ci engine making way for the 117, and the result should be a boost in torque, with the previous gen making 155nm at 3,250 and 94 horses of peak power at 5,020rpm. I didn't get any specific numbers in the press release for this one but if you look at the other bikes in the lineup with the 117, so the ST versions of the Road Glide and Street Glide, you're looking at 168nm at 3,500 which is a decent increase, and then 103hp at 5,450rpm.

On top of that, quite literally, you've now got a much bigger fuel tank. The previous YMs had a 13.2L tank which really isn't much for a massive V-Twin like this so range is going to be limited, but for 2023 it gets 18.9L which isn't just a token increase. That's almost 6 more litres which will add over 40% more range.

Then you've got a new higher bar position, new chrome finishing on some of the hardware, the heavy breather air intake, and some 26 spoke cast aluminium wheels which look pretty bling. The only downside is that the price has gone up vs last year, but I think the performance increase and extra range make it reasonable to justify.

NIGHTSTER SPECIAL (From £15,395)

But perhaps of most interest given its far more accessible price point will be the new Nightster Special. The is the new LC successor to the Sportster lineup that I was lucky enough to test out last year, and on first impressions it was pretty impressive. But this platform was always going to lead to some more iterations, and for 2023 we've got this new Special.

Firstly it gets a big update to the dash with the round analogue speedo swapped out for a 4-inch TFT display which I assume came straight off the Sportster S. That means that you now get phone connectivity for call handling and media playback, you can do voice commands through a headset, and there's the navigation system offered by the Harley app that will show up on the new display. On top of that there’s a new custom riding mode in addition to the existing rain, road and sport, that's going to allow you to dial in your own settings for the rider aids and modes which simply wasn't possible with the simplicity of the old dash. And there's TPMS.

Comfort gets a boost with the passenger seat and pegs as standard, cruise control as standard, and the a more upright and therefore potentially more comfortable riding position courtesy of the bars being moved up and back.

Looks-wise it's a little more fancy with a silver finish on some new cross-spoked cast wheels, presumably to give a bit of the look of some proper spoked wheels. And there's the retro Harley tank badge with 3 colour options of black, blue and yellow.

All in all it looks pretty sweet, although it's going to be a couple of grand on top of the standard Nightster, so I'm looking forward to finding out whether it's worth it. In fact, we've got a deeper walkaround video of this bike coming in the next few days, so look out on our Youtube channel

And if you haven't seen my review of the standard Nightster, get the low down in the video linked below.