Nidecker Ultralight Snowboard Review

Board: Nidecker Ultralight 2024

Price: $999 (USD recommended retail)

Style: Freeride

Flex Rating: Stiff

Flex Feel: Stiff (9/10)

Rating Score: 85.3/100

Compared to other Men’s Freeride Boards

Overview of the Ultralight’s Specs

Check out the tables for the Ultralight’s specs and available sizes.

Specs

Who is the Ultralight Most Suited To?

The Ultralight is best suited to someone searching for a super stiff, take no prisoners ride that can handle any speed they throw at it and carve trenches. Even better if you also like to take it into powder on powder days. 

Does the powder, speed and carving trio very well, but outside of that it's not super versatile. A board you've got to work for everything. It gives back when you put it in, but you've got to put it in. This is not a board to ride casual or playful on. 

Definitely not for beginners and even intermediates are likely to struggle, unless you're super strong/athletic. Even then, you want really good technique on this board - so really just for advanced and up, IMO. 

THE Ultralight IN MORE DETAIL

Bindings angles: +15/-15

Stance width: 22″ (560mm)

Stance Setback: Setback 1.2" (30mm)

Width at Inserts: 10.6" (268mm) at front insert and 10.5" (266mm) at back insert.   

Rider Height: 6'0"

Rider Weight: 180lbs

Rider Boot Size: US9.5 Adidas Response ADV

Bindings Used: Burton Malavita, M

Weight: 6lbs 6oz (2880grams) 

Weight per cm: 17.89 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 Ultralight, as it should be given its name, was lighter than the average board. On snow, I did notice that lightness. Typically a stiff board like this feels heavier than its weight would suggest and this is the case here. It didn't feel ultra light but it still felt lighter than normal, despite its stiffness. Also to note that I don't often ride boards over 161, so definitely light for its size.  

Powder

Nothing to test in on the day, but based on the feel and specs of the board I'd imagine it would be really good in powder. 

It's got a tapered directional shape, with a good setback and a healthy amount of taper. It's also got some rocker in the nose and is certainly stiff enough that the nose isn't going to overflex and nosedive. 

Carving

Held on to everything I could throw at it. A carving beast. 

Turning

Ease of Turns/Slashing: This board wants you to ride on edge. Not easy to release tail to slash. You've got to put weight into every turn. With good technique it's not too fatiguing but certainly not an easy board to turn. 

Maneuverability at slow speeds (nimbleness): It's not quite as bad as I was anticipating, but it's still not the kind of board that's super agile at slow speeds. Feels much better when it's got speed under it.

Catchiness: You've got to watch your technique, not a skidder. It wasn't catchy to a point of making me feel uncomfortable with it though. 

Speed

Could take pretty much any speed and felt super stable. Wanted to go fast and preferred being ridden fast.

Uneven Terrain

Crud: Was pretty damp for how light it is. But not ultra ultra damp. It took care of everything in its path though. I had mostly soft, slushy crud to deal with, but it would have been good at smashing anything, I imagine. 

Trees/Bumps: Not super fast edge-to-edge when being ridden slow, so not ideal for trees. Stiffer than I'd prefer for trees, personally. 

Jumps

Just too stiff for me to really enjoy it for jumps. 

Pop: There was some there, but you really had to wrestle it out of it. Not easy to access pop. 

Approach: Super stable for faster approaches, where you pick your line and don't deviate. But if you need to make any corrections/speed checks, it's not as willing. 

Landing: Solid when you get it right, but not super forgiving if you get it wrong.

Side-hits: Not my favorite board for side hits. Takes too much effort to line it up and pop too difficult to extract. 

Small jumps/Big jumps: Best for experienced riders on bigger jumps. 

Switch

Not ideal for riding switch. The stiffness makes it more difficult to ride the other way, and because of its directional-ness, it's not super natural riding switch. Transitions required concentration too, to make sure you didn't catch an edge when transitioning. 

Butters

There was pretty much no flex in tip and tail. You really needed to throw everything into it to get it to press just a little bit. Not great for buttering/pressing. 

They honestly called have called this thing "Ultrastiff" rather than Ultralight. I have ridden stiffer but not for a while and there aren't many out there this stiff. Torsionally stiff too. 

This board was always going to be too stiff for me to love it (don't typically like overly stiff boards), but I liked it more than I thought I would, given how stiff it is. If you like your board rabid stiff, and want to optimize speed, powder and carving at the expense of everything else, then this might be right up your alley.