Never Summer Swift Snowboard Review

Hello and welcome to my Never Summer Swift review.

In this review, I will take a look at the Swift as a mellow freeride snowboard.

As per tradition here at SnowboardingProfiles.com I will give the Swift a score out of 100 (based on several factors) and see how it compares with other mellow freeride snowboards.

Overall Rating

Board: Never Summer Swift

Price: $699

Style: Mellow Freeride

Flex Rating: Medium Stiff (7/10)

Flex Feel on Snow: Medium (6/10)

Rating Score: 92.8/100

Compared to other Men’s Mellow Freeride Boards.

Of the 28 current model mellow freeride snowboards that we tested:

❄️ The Swift ranked 1st out of 28!

Who is the Swift Most Suited To?

The Swift is best suited to someone looking to add a tree/powder board to their quiver. But in saying that, it could be a one-board-quiver for the right rider. 

It's not something you have to ride in powder to have fun on, that's just where it will excel the most. If you like to ride trees, even when there's very little or no powder, this board performs really well in there. And while I didn't find it a carving at high speed demon, it's no slouch on a carve or at speed either. Moderate speed carves feel really nice, so just carving up (or just cruising) the groomers works on this board too.  

So, if your riding is predominantly trees, powder when you can get it, some moderate speed carves/just cruising groomers when there's not powder, but want something that's super agile and is also fun on small to medium jumps and side-hits (straight air or 360, but not so much 180s etc). 

Otherwise as a quiver addition, play it to its strengths and rip through trees and hunt down powder.

I didn't find it an overly demanding board to ride, so should be fine for intermediate riders all the way up to expert riders, particularly those who want a mellower feel or who may be getting older or recovering from an injury and don't want a board they have to physically fight or get fatigued by, by the end of the day. 

The Swift in More Detail

Bindings angles: +15/-15

Stance width: 520mm (20.5″)

Stance Setback: Unknown on effective edge. Setback 3.35" (85mm) on total length of board. Never Summer have that figure at 3.25" (83mm). Though they may have rounded to the nearest 1/4". 

Width at front inserts: 272mm (10.7")

Width at back insert: 266mm (10.5")

Rider Height: 6'0"

Rider Weight: 180lbs

Rider Boot Size: US9.5 Adidas Response ADV

Bindings Used: Burton Malavita M

Control Board for Control Laps: Lib Tech Terrain Wrecker 

Weight: 3140grams (6lbs 15oz)

Weight per cm: 19.87 grams/cm

Average Weight per cm: 18.71 grams/cm*

*based on a sample size of around 250 models that I’ve weighed in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023 & 2024 models. The Swift is heavier than average on the scales. Some of that is that it's wider than the average 158. But it's not super wide. But weight per surface area would be closer to the average than the weight per length suggests. And on snow it felt normal, weight-wise. 

Flex

Never Summer rates the Swift 7/10 flex, but I felt it at 6/10 flex. 

The tail is stiffer than the rest of the board, and I'd say that feels around a 7/10 to 7.5/10. But through the middle of the board it's not as stiff as the tail. 

The torsional flex is also pretty easy going, not stiff torsionally, which helps to make it the easy turner that it is. 

Powder

No real powder to test in, but from the feel of the board (and the specs back it up), it should be really sweet in powder. It has a decent amount of setback on overall length of board, a nose that is significantly longer and wider (20mm of taper) than the tail and a decent amount of rocker in the nose. All of this should help it to float well in powder. 

Carving

It's not a high speed, hard carving beast or anything, but it feels really nice on a moderate speed carve. You can lay into fairly aggressive carves at moderate speeds, without it washing out or anything. But it has its limits - get too aggressive or try to carve at too high a speed and it can start letting go.

Given the rocker in the profile, the relatively friendly torsional flex and the 20mm of taper, it was never going to be a carving sensation when at higher speed, but all that said, it wasn't bad at all on a carve, particularly at moderate speeds. 

Turning

Ease of Turning/Slashing: The biggest surprise with this board was just how easy it was to turn. I've tested multiple hundreds of boards over the years and not much genuinely surprises me anymore. You know the occasional "I wasn't quite expecting that" but this thing genuinely surprised me with just how easy it was to turn and slash with.  

Maneuverability at slow speeds: Lightning fast edge-to-edge and effortless  is how I found this board. Yes, I did ride it with a narrow stance width - and that does help with maneuverability, but the difference it makes (from experiments I've done in the past) doesn't account for how effortlessly you could make super fast turns at slow speeds on this board. A really good snap/spring out of turns. 

Catchiness: Definitely wouldn't call it catchy. Would also not call it the most uncatchy board in the world. But for an solid intermediate rider and up I wouldn't have any concerns with catchiness on this board. 

Speed

I didn't feel it was an out and out bomber or anything, but decently fast and decently stable at speed. Felt some chatter and wasn't invincible when getting up to decently high speeds. 

Uneven Terrain

Crud: Was pretty good at smashing through crud. But it wasn't unshakeable or anything. You felt it a little and in the serious stuff, you get a bit bucked around. If it's something you can go over the top of, it's all good. It's not ultra damp either, so you feel some chatter. 

In terms of dampness I found it damper than average, but nothing crazy damp or anything. So it surprised me to learn that Never Summer rate this an 8/10 for dampness. 6/10 at most by my feel. Which isn't a bad thing for me. Too much dampness and I find I loose feel of the board and feel the board tends to lack snap. For the amount of snap I felt from this board, that amount of dampness was quite high - a good mix of snap and dampness, IMO.

If you're someone who likes your board super damp and saw that 8/10 rating and starting drooling, just know that it wasn't my experience that it felt as damp as that. If you're like me and were put off by the 8/10 dampness rating, don't necessarily right off this board, because in my experience it definitely wasn't overly damp and had a great mix of dampness and snap. 

Trees/Bumps: About as perfect as it gets, IMO! Lightning quick edge-to-edge and you get that quickness with very little effort, so you're not fatigued by the time you've done 50 feet through a tree line. And for how well this board is setup for powder, there's no doubt it would be just as good or even better when there was powder in the trees. 

Jumps

Definitely not what this board was designed for, but was actually pretty fun and had more snap than I was expecting for sure.

Pop: I wouldn't call it's total pop epic, but it's decent enough. And that pop is pretty easy to extract as well. Not as easy access as some softer boards, but still nothing that you have to throw all your weight behind just to get it to pop or anything. 

Approach: A good of being stable enough, but also easy to make line adjustments and speed check with, without it feeling catchy or slow to adjust (in fact one of the easier boards to adjust). Feels a bit weird in switch, so if you're looking to do switch 180s/540s etc, then it's going to be difficult. I didn't attempt. 

Landing: Not a stomper, but solid enough on landings. Just don't want to land too tail heavy. There's some tail there to help out, but not heaps. Landing switch is not as good! Backside 180s felt pretty sketchy. 

Side-hits: Quite enjoyed the Swift on side-hits. But really just for straight airs. Not so much 180s. 

Small jumps/Big Jumps: Best for small to medium. 

Switch

Doable but feels weird. The nose feels long and the tail short and when you switch that around it feels a bit weird and you don't want to hit anything too rough. And with there being way more camber towards the tail, which feels good when riding normally, you now have all this camber on your front foot and not much at the back and the nose is softer flexing than the tail, so that reverses. Just an odd feeling. Doable on a well groomed gentle slope but otherwise not the best.

Spins

360s feel OK, but anything in multiples of 180 not so much (see switch above). 

Butters

The tail is the stiffest part of this board. It softens up through the middle and into the nose. While the overall flex felt like a 6/10 to me. The tail is more like a 7/10, maybe 7.5/10. The Nose is easier to press in terms of its flex, but actually more awkward because of how long it is. So quite a different feel between tail and nose. Not what this board is good at, but not what it's made for either.  

Score Breakdown and Final Verdict

Check out the breakdown of the score in the table below.

The Swift, for me, was one of those boards that genuinely surprised me - and after just a few turns on this thing, I had a smile from ear-to-ear. The way this effortlessly sprang from edge-to-edge was a tree line dream come true. 

Combine that with specs and a feel that would suggest it would be great in powder (we didn't have any on the day) and this would be the first board you'd reach for if you got a powder day and wanted to spend it in the trees. Those foggy days where you can't see much outside the trees, but inside the visibility suddenly becomes perfect. 

But it's not a one-trick pony either. It's actually really good on a carve, so long as you don't push the speed too much, and is actually pretty fun for straight airs on jumps and side-hits. 

It's predominantly a quiver board, but could definitely make a one-board quiver for the right riding style.