Arguably the most boutique of boutique brands, there can’t be many of us who haven’t fanaticised about owning a Yeti at some point or other. The brand’s been doing things its own way in turquoise and making stunning bikes for decades; most recently using its signature Switch Infinity suspension on SB-labelled trail and enduro bikes of which this SB165 has the longest travel.

Yeti SB165 need to know

• 165mm rear travel and a Fox coil shock make this the most DH-orientated bike in Yeti’s retail line up
• Full carbon Turq-series frame uses the brand’s best fibres and construction methods to save weight and build-in double crown fork compatibility
• Switch Infinity suspension has the most progressive leverage rate of any SB Yeti, with 22% average progressivity
• Latest model ditches dual 27.5in wheels in favour of an MX 29/27.5in set-up
• Kit list blends SRAM electronic T-Type drivetrain and brakes with Fox Factory suspension, dropper and some Yeti own brand parts
• Four frame sizes up to 505mm reach with chainstays growing from 433mm to 439mm depending on the size

Since the rise of enduro, Yeti’s specialist machines have been the SB66 followed by the SB150 (that morphed into the Yeti SB160 we tested here) and, more recently, this SB165 that leans more towards freeride and DH playtime than the purer race pedigree of the other bikes. Which begs the question, can the SB165 follow its more illustrious stablemate – the SB160 – on to our rundown of the best enduro bikes on the market?

The Yeti SB165 doesn’t like standing still, even if it looks mighty fine when it does.

I’ve always thought of the brand as pretty cutting-edge and up on all the latest trends, but what’s interesting is this latest SB165 is actually the first MX (mixed wheel) size bike Yeti has ever offered. Previous generation SB165s came with a 180mm fork and dual 27.5in wheels, which likely explained why it didn’t really make much of an impact on a public already sold on bigger wheels. Although it took plenty of impacts caused by some of its riders bolting on twin crown DH forks and chucking it off cliffs at Rampage.

Yeti’s latest 165 incarnation comes with a shorter 170mm travel fork (now it has a bigger 29in front wheel), and a coil shock out back; in this case a Fox DHX2 with a DH-length stroke and 4-way adjustability. Four models are offered laid up in two tiers of carbon fibre frame with prices ranging from £6k to £9.5k.

Our top-end Turq-series test bike here has all the drool factor you’d expect, as well as all the latest incremental frame updates carried over from the shorter travel SB bikes. Higher grade carbon fibre saves weight (around 225g) from the frame, as well as your wallet – this T3 model using SRAM’s latest T-Type electronic gears is the best part of ten grand. The beautiful SB165 frame comes in black, and there’s also another colour option called Spruce (a kind of metallic teal), but it’s a bit surprising to not see Yeti’s iconic turquoise colourway among the options.

A head badged steeped in legend and history. Yeti is one of the originals, and still as desirable now, as it was in the 80s and 90s.

Frame and geometry

Yeti’s long-standing Switch Infinity suspension platform (produced in partnership with Fox) has had a bunch of tweaks and refinements to improve durability and serviceability. Bearings now press into Fox’s aluminium linkage parts, rather than Yeti’s main carbon frame, and the pivot axles use a floating layout with locking collets to keep everything snug.

The SB 165 bottom bracket shell is now threaded, like other SBs, and the cable routing is internal and fully tunnelled throughout, with bolt-on exit clamps to keep cables from rattling or rubbing. It’s neat and tidy (and proved totally silent during testing), just like the beefier-than-before chunky chainstay protector that silences any chain slap effectively, even inside the seatstay part.

The Switch Infinity link is compact, and better protected than before. First it slides up, then down, effectively raising the pivot, then lowering it again.

In terms of the general shape, this Yeti manages to look totally modern while simultaneously giving a nod back to the brand’s roots and original looptail hardtails. Subtle styling and smooth lines integrate the complex Switch Infinity extremely elegantly, and there’s a neater down tube tucked in tighter, with a less-pronounced kink than older SB,s for better clearance underneath. The 165 frame’s belly also has a new dual-density guard, in case you still can’t keep it from smashing into rocks or roots.

There’s tons of standover clearance for knees and thighs, and also more dropper post insertion depth, which allows this size Large to come with a 200mm Fox Transfer post, and there’s still room for a water bottle inside the front triangle on every size. Despite the frame looking pretty sleek and lightweight, it’s sturdy enough for Yeti to rate it for use with up to a 190mm dual crown fork, and it offers a lifetime warranty on all parts, including the complicated Switch Infinity set up.

SRAM’S wireless T-Type mech attaches to the UDH interface.

Yeti has, unsurprisingly, added SRAM’s UDH as well, which means that this T3 can run the rock-solid SRAM T-Type drivetrain (that gets more impressive the more I use it). The clean looping back end and axle set up looks very neat, but I did have to reset the rear mech angle (which is a faff) each time I removed the rear wheel, which is something I’ve not had an issue with on other T-Type bikes so far.

At 176cm, I’m bang in the middle of Yeti’s medium size recommendation, but this isn’t a massive bike and the 480mm reach on the Large felt absolutely perfect to me, so I’d advise going off your typical reach preference, or swing a leg over one if you can, rather than rely on Yeti’s guide.

The Fox DHX2 coil shock has four-way damping adjustment, but skimping on the lightweight coil, considering this is a £10k build, seems stingy.

Suspension

While it looks complicated up close, Switch Infinity is packaged beautifully in the bigger silhouette to encase the two Fox Kashima-coated shafts inside the front triangle. For the latest T-series models like this, Yeti has also developed new high-quality bearings, seals and shock hardware to move more smoothly and offer a longer service life and external grease ports that demand an injection every 40 hours of riding aim to keep Switch sliding smoothly.

I’ve seen Yeti SBs owned by riding buddies wear through the slippery coating on these shafts in UK conditions previously, so any extra wear life (covered under lifetime warranty since 2019 anyway) is welcome, but you need to shell out for this Turq version for the best quality hardware, as the C-series frames still rely on the old set up.

These twin Fox shafts might look like little shocks, but the struts essentially just allow the main pivot to rock as the rear wheel moves up and down, so that the pivot point, or fulcrum, shifts position deeper in the travel. Yeti describe its system as a four-bar, but it’s easier to imagine it as a single pivot where the pivot point changes height as it switches direction, and alternates between the beginning and mid-section of travel and the end stroke.

The Fox 38 fork gets the older Grip2 damper, but arguably feels better for it.

It’s pretty clever, and means Yeti can tune the suspension firstly for a relatively flat and high anti-squat curve – for an efficient pedalling platform around sag and mid-stroke – and then make the anti-squat drastically drop away for freedom of suspension movement once the Switch Infinity reverses direction. There is also a reduction in leverage force and more bottom-out resistance built into the design once the pivot point shifts, with 27.5% progressivity at the end of the stroke on the SB165.

And if you think all this going on while you roll over bumps might translate as some kind of weird funky feeling in the feet, think again; any changes in leverage and anti-squat feel completely natural, and this SB165 has a smooth and supportive stroke, and none of the slight see-saw feeling I remembered from early Switch Infinity designs, such as the SB66 a decade or so ago.

Not quite as bad as wearing sandals on a building site, but the SB165 still has some fairly inappropriate footwear considering how capable it is. We’d expect a Maxx Grip front tyre and Double Down rear casing at the very least.

Components

The first thing to say (scream?) here is why on earth is Yeti speccing firmer Maxx Terra Maxxis tyres at both ends on a 165mm travel mini-dh bike? And, even worse, why are both EXO+ casing, when a thicker, more protective (DD at least) is appropriate on the back of any bike like this?

I took the SB165 out to the Alps in a bike bag for a three-day enduro race and only realised on arrival that the front tyre was Maxx Terra, not Maxx Grip (I thought I could just about get away with the newer EXO+ casing). Luckily, I had a spare DH tyre to swap over, or it would have been a bitter €100 pill to replace it in a ski resort, or a potential race ruiner to try and run it on some gnarly stages in the wet.

The Burgtec stem is at the heart of a great no-nonsense cockpit. The bars and grips are comfortable and take the sting out of the trail.

At least the tyres are mounted to DT Swiss’s bombproof EX1700s, and the Yeti carbon bar with a Burgtec MK3 stem is the kind of kit you’d likely upgrade too yourself on a rival big brand rig where they tend to save costs on own brand components. Ditto the soft and cushioned ODI Expert grips that are a firm MBR favourite.

The rest of Yeti’s spec list leaves little to complain about either, although the stock SRAM Code RSC brakes were getting a little overworked on massive 15min+ alpine race stages. So I swapped rotors to put the bigger 220mm Centreline on the back for extra power. This is an aside, but who else finds a smaller rotor on the front harder to lock up in switchbacks, wants more power on the back, and doesn’t know why more bikes don’t come specced this way round in the first place? I’m also not entirely sure why the four-piston brakes aren’t the new slimline Stealth models either, and can only assume it’s a decision based on cost, which is a bit of a mickey-take on a near ten grand bike.

Big forks with a big rotor. But we could have done with more power from the SRAM brakes.

Fox’s 200mm Transfer post has a ton of height drop for longer legs, but it did get sticky from time to time in testing, unlike the brand’s 38 fork and DHX2 shock, that are about as slippy as a very slippery thing, and worked flawlessly throughout. For some reason though, I ran the Factory Grip2 38 damping a tad more open on rebound than I usually do on other bikes to better balance with the rear end.

The four-way adjustable DHX2 gives a ton of scope for on-the-fly ride tuning, and you can basically add or subtract low speed compression and rebound damping to tune the bike’s support to taste. It’s a bit mean you only get the lighter Super Alloy spring on the frame-only option, and the bog-standard heavy steel coil here, but it only adds weight, rather than affects ride quality, and both editor Danny and myself found a sweet spot with the same 500lb spring, Danny being nearly 10kg lighter. Proof this bike has a wide operating window, even without the optimal set-up.

The SRAM X0 cranks is a good looking unit, and the turquoise chain guide is a nice touch.

Drilling deeper into that perfect set up, it’s easy to turn a couple of DHX2 knobs and change the bike’s character between super-fluid, with the rear end tracking every single ripple for blind enduro racing (and extra comfort and more reaction time), to a tauter response better suited to bike parks. With this balance dialled in for Pila bike park, I had more support to push against for huge g-outs, braking bumps and constantly steep gradients. The Yeti totally shines in both guises, with the key trait of remaining supremely well balanced between wheels, so you never feel like you have to shift body weight around to stay centred.

Yeti has built-on the stellar ride reputation of the SB150 and taken the SB165’s handling to new heights.

Performance – How it rides

Speaking of balance, I’ve not had a chance to ride the SB160, but from what I’ve heard from colleagues (and my experience on the older SB150), you have to be mindful on that bike to ride with a slightly forced forward stance to keep the front tyre loaded, and also that the rider position feels altogether ‘racier’.

Want bigger wheels in an EDR-winning package? The Yeti SB160 is basically the 165 with a bigger rear wheel.

By that, I mean you might have a slightly lower bar and a ride position with head slightly lower in a forward attacking position to get the most out of it. Think of the SB160 then as a super-fast bike where the rear tyre sort of follows the front of the bike a bit, rather than one you ride more upright or with more weight back and heels down.

On this more neutral SB165, this weight balance isn’t the case, and it sounds like me and MBR editor Danny (who took this Yeti out to the Swiss alps at Crans Montana), both immediately intuitively took to it like a duck to water, despite one of us being around 2cm shorter and around 10kg heavier. In fact, Danny’s pretty succinct verdict after his trip was, ‘it’s a ripper!”. And, while I’m not obliged to toe the editorial line, I’d have to say I’m in 100% agreement about Yeti’s longest travel all-rounder being an absolute beauty.

What goes down, must come up, and the Yeti is remarkably comfortable given its gravity prowess.

Climbing

No 165mm bike’s climbing ability is likely to be anything to write home about, but after racing the SB165 for three days through 16 huge enduro stages, with some horrible punchy climbs and sprints, and also multiple hundreds of metres climbing liaisons, I can confidently write that it’s not too bad at all.

It feels reasonably light considering its capability, and the pedal action is very smooth and consistent, with no annoying or weird pulsing sometimes found on bikes with too much anti-squat. Even sprinting hard with the Fox coil shock wide open, I could get where I was going without too much drama, more in the manner of the majority of 160mm-ish enduro bikes. But, obviously, you’re not going to power uphill like on a 15kg trail bike.

There’s a climb switch if you want it, but the kinematics are honed enough not to really need it.

One interesting aspect of the pedalling performance is the lock out on the DHX2 shock certainly doesn’t lock the back end out, and a couple of times I ended up doing bike park laps by accident with it on. Like this, the Yeti just feels like it has slightly more compression damping and support, so it’s actually a useful extra setting for bike park-y tracks and bermy trails, even if it’s not strictly meant to be.

In terms of the geo numbers, the effective seat angle (I’m not sure what saddle height Yeti measures it at) is slightly shallower than some, but I had zero issues with seated climbing position and got comfy winching up some really steep forest tracks – as much as sitting locked sweating in one position, powering up one of the toughest TDF climbs ( the Col de La Loze) for an hour.

Whether you want to go fast, or have fun, the Yeti SB165 is a willing partner.

Descending

As mentioned, I’ve ridden the old SB150 a lot, and while that bike was super-fast and capable, I’d describe the suspension as efficient, whereas this SB165 can be set to just gobble up and spit out all manner of nastiness without coming up for air. There’s a calmness that never feels too hyperactive or unsettling, even panic braking into sudden hairpins. And it’s so smooth over the ground in fact, I reckon it’s every bit as effective rubbing out bumps and chunk than Trek’s latest Slash HP I reviewed last month. Not too shabby, when that bike’s entire engineering remit is all about eating up the chunk.

Yeti’s suspension and geometry combine so you can set the SB165 to be a true monster truck if you want it to be, and running the DHX2 damping more open sees the chassis float over even really beaten-up nasty bumps and holes (like entering steep natural Alpine corners) while barely registering them.

Acres of clearance give room to throw the SB165 around.

This isolation from getting hammered in the arms and lower back is never at the expense of feeling too soggy or getting pitched off the back down super steep woods or punching massive berms either, and it’s rare a bike this plush keeps rider weight so well centred. So, rather than dangling off the back like a flat pedal downhiller, I could steer the SB165 ship from the bridge, and whatever huge waves were coming at me while bombing down super-fast singletrack felt more like ripples on a mill pond than surfing Atlantic swell. This bought me extra reaction time and additional composure, letting me ride even faster when the trails got rough and technical.

The smoothness and control in the suspension is also backed up by a frame that seems to offer just the perfect amount of stiffness, without ever being too edgy or sharp either.

The Yeti dilutes any harshness from the trail, but feels stiff enough to deal with high g-force corners.

Because the SB165 never bottoms out harshly landing deep off big jumps, and has a really delicate touchdown when the back end slaps into the ground, it gave me something approaching an air of invincibility, and of all the bikes I’ve raced enduro on in the Alps over the years, I reckon this is the one I’ve felt most confident and comfortable on yet. The rear-end absorbs bumps quickly and smoothly, so that line choice feels easy, and grip at both tyres is huge, even on deep, beaten up berms or rough bumpy off-cambers with square edge hits that would upset lesser bikes. The SB165 does all this without ever feeling cumbersome or over-travelled when hitting up jumps or pumping down blues and reds in the bike park.

Normally, there’s so much you want to say about a bike’s performance because you’re always trying to get the bottom of little quirks, or highlight what a bike does well versus the things that somehow don’t feel quite perfect. But if there are no annoying things to complain about, as a reviewer you kind of get a bit stumped. And that’s where I’m at with the SB165. In terms of suspension, handling and geometry, Yeti has dialled this bike to do pretty much anything involving gravity so well, that from the first lap down an Italian mountain, I was completely sold. It also pedals as well as I could expect from a long travel coil-sprung bike, and in 10 full days of lift riding and thousands of metres of descending, it didn’t put a foot wrong.

You’ll need good eyesight to spot a Yeti blasting through the trees.

While I’m not sure you could ever say a mountain bike costing £9,500 is worth it, especially one with totally inappropriate tyres, at least Yeti is providing one of the best pedal-able gravity bikes on the market for your hard-earned cash. It also looks amazing (although who doesn’t want a turquoise Yeti?) and the bottom line is I reckon you’d struggle to get better performance and versatility from any other long travel enduro bike on the market.