Shimano Cues Explained: Why It's on Our Claud Butler & Dawes Bikes

If you've been looking at the spec sheets on our Claud Butler or Dawes bikes lately, you'll have noticed a word that wasn't there a couple of years ago: Cues. It's on the Alpina, the Ridge 2.0, both Wraths and the top-end Dawes Discovery. And every week someone rings the order line and asks, quite reasonably, "What is it, and is it any good?"

Short answer: Cues is Shimano's new mid-range groupset, it replaces the Altus, Acera and Alivio kit that's been on affordable bikes for twenty years, and it's built to last longer — particularly on e-bikes. Here's the longer version, from the people who fit, adjust and warranty-repair the stuff every day in our local dealership.

What actually is Shimano Cues?

Shimano announced Cues in early 2023. For years, mid-priced bikes ran a ladder of groupsets — Tourney at the bottom, then Altus, Acera, Alivio, and 10/11-speed Deore at the top — each with its own chain widths, cassette spacing and compatibility quirks. A shop like ours had to stock spares for all of them, and a customer with an 8-speed Altus bike couldn't easily upgrade to a 9-speed Acera cassette without changing half the drivetrain.

Cues sweeps most of that away. It's one family, in three tiers, that share the same design language and — crucially — the same cassette and chain standard:

• U4000 — 9-speed. The workhorse tier. This is what's on the Ridge 2.0, Wrath 1.0, Alpina 1.0 and Dawes Discovery 3.0.
• U6000 — 10- and 11-speed, with a clutch rear mech. This is on the Wrath 2.0 and Alpina 2.0.
• U8000 — 11-speed, the premium trekking/touring tier. Not on anything we currently sell.

Because the tiers share standards, a shifter from one tier will generally work with a rear mech from another, and cassettes and chains are interchangeable within a speed count. For you, that means simpler spares and cheaper repairs. For us, it means one set of parts on the shelf instead of four.

Linkglide: the bit that matters

The technology underneath Cues is called Linkglide, and it's the reason we're pleased to see it on our bikes.

Traditional Shimano cassettes use a system called Hyperglide, designed to shift as fast and smoothly as possible. Linkglide is designed to shift smoothly and wear slowly. The teeth on a Linkglide cassette are thicker and taller than on the old Altus and Acera cassettes, the shift ramps are shaped so the chain climbs between sprockets rather than being forced across, and the whole thing is built for the extra load an electric motor puts through the chain. Shimano's own claim is that Linkglide cassettes last significantly longer than Hyperglide equivalents — up to three times, in their testing — and that the system is much less prone to dropping or skipping under power.

We can't promise you'll get three times the miles out of a cassette; that depends on how you ride and whether you ever clean your chain. What we can say is that in the workshop we're seeing far fewer worn, hooked sprockets come back on Cues bikes than we used to on Altus and Acera, and the shifting stays crisp for longer between services.

The trade-off is that Linkglide shifting is a fraction slower under full pedal pressure than a top-end Hyperglide race groupset. On a hybrid or a hub-drive e-MTB, you'll never notice.

1x9, 1x10 or 2x9: which setup do you want?

Cues comes in single-chainring (1x) and double-chainring (2x) versions, and we sell both. Here's how they compare on our bikes:

1x (single chainring) is what nearly every modern mountain bike runs. There's no front derailleur to adjust or mis-shift, the chain is held on by a narrow/wide chainring (and a clutch mech on U6000), and all your gears are in one shifter. On an e-bike it's the obvious choice: you don't need a huge top-end because the motor cuts out at 15.5mph, and the 11–46 or 11–48 cassettes give you a proper crawler gear for when the battery's low.

2x (double chainring) gives you more gears overall and — more usefully — smaller steps between them, so you can always find a comfortable cadence. That matters on a hybrid you're pedalling under your own steam with a week's shopping in the panniers, which is why Dawes chose Cues 2x9 for the Discovery 3.0. On the Alpina 1.0 the 22/36 chainset gives a seriously low bottom gear for steep climbs without a motor to help.

If you're not sure: e-bike, get 1x. Unassisted hybrid or tourer, 2x is worth having. Unassisted mountain bike, either — the 2.0 Alpina's 1x10 is the nicer setup, but the 1.0's 2x9 is £79 cheaper and just as tough.

Cues vs Altus, Acera and Tourney

Because Cues is replacing the old groupsets rather than sitting above them, you'll see both on our shelves for a while yet. Here's how they line up:

Tourney is entry-level. It works, it's cheap to replace, and it's fine on a £300 bike that does the school run. But it's 7-speed, the shifting is agricultural, and the cassettes wear quickly.

Altus and Acera have been the sensible mid-range for years — the Ridge 1.0's Altus 1x8 is a perfectly good drivetrain, and we'd never talk you out of a bike because of it. They just weren't designed with a motor in mind, and the cassettes are thinner.

Cues is the step up: wider gear ranges, chain retention that Shimano says is on a par with their high-end mountain bike groups, a cassette that outlasts the old ones, and spares that'll be in stock for a decade. On an e-bike it's the drivetrain we'd pick every time. The Ridge 2.0's jump from Altus 1x8 to Cues 1x9 is a big part of why we rate it so highly.

Does it change how you look after the bike?

Not much. Keep the chain clean and lightly oiled, and it'll be happy. Two things worth knowing:

1. Replace like with like. When the cassette eventually wears, fit a Cues/Linkglide cassette, not an old Hyperglide part from the back of the shed — the tooth profiles are different and the shifting won't be right. Chains on the 9- and 10-speed bikes we sell are standard 9/10-speed items (the Ridge 2.0 and Discovery 3.0 ship with KMC chains), so those are easy. We keep the cassettes in stock and they aren't expensive.
2. Cable-actuated, so it's serviceable anywhere. Cues is mechanical, not electronic. Any decent bike shop can index it, and you can do it yourself with a 5mm Allen key and a bit of patience.

Which of our bikes have Cues?

• Claud Butler Alpina 1.0 — £520.99. Cues 2x9, 22/36T, 11–36T. MT200 hydraulic brakes. Review.
• Claud Butler Alpina 2.0 — £599.99. Cues 1x10, 32T narrow/wide, 11–48T. 14.5kg.
• Claud Butler Ridge 2.0 — £1,299.99. Cues 1x9, 11–46T. 45Nm motor, hydraulic brakes. Review.
• Claud Butler Wrath 1.0 — £1,317.99. Cues 1x9, 11–36T. 29er e-MTB, 360Wh.
• Claud Butler Wrath 2.0 — £1,467.99. Cues U6000 1x10, 11–48T. 45Nm, 540Wh. Wrath 1.0 vs 2.0.
• Dawes Discovery 3.0 — £584.99. Cues 2x9, 46/30T, 11–36T, MT200 hydraulic brakes. Currently sold out — sign up for the restock alert.

The Ridge 2.0, Wraths and Discovery 3.0 come in and out of stock in batches from the manufacturer, so if one's showing as sold out, it's usually a few weeks rather than gone for good.

The honest summary

Cues isn't a marketing gimmick. It's Shimano tidying up twenty years of mid-range groupsets into one family that shifts well, lasts longer and copes with e-bike motors. If you're choosing between two otherwise similar bikes and one has Cues, that's a real point in its favour — especially on an electric bike, where the chain and cassette take the most punishment. If the bike you like has Altus or Acera, it's still a good bike; you'll just replace the cassette a bit sooner.

Every bike we sell — Cues or not — is built and safety-checked in our Shrewsbury workshop, with free UK delivery, a 12-month warranty and 90-day no-quibble returns. And if you're buying through your employer, Bike2Work and Cycle to Work can save you up to 42% on any of the bikes above.

More from the blog

• Claud Butler Alpina Review — Is It the Best Mountain Bike Under £500?
• Claud Butler Ridge 1.0 Review: The Best Budget Electric Mountain Bike?
• Electric Bikes Explained: Are They Worth It?

Ready to find your next bike?

Shop all Claud Butler bikes → Check the Alpina 2.0 price → Check the Wrath 2.0 price →

Still not sure which setup suits you? Ring the shop or drop us an email with where you ride and how hilly it is, and we'll give you a straight answer.