Ultimate Addons heated grips review | Premium Plus test
By John Milbank
Consumer Editor of Bennetts BikeSocial
10.12.2025
Date reviewed: October 2025 | Tested by: John Milbank | Price: £159.99 (RRP) | Ultimate Addons.com
The Ultimate Addons Premium Plus heated grips on review here are a compact, self-contained pair of replacement powered grips that offer good performance in cold weather thanks to a range of settings and a powerful output.
I fitted them to my 2001 Honda VFR800 to find out how good they are…
Pros & Cons
Good heat output
No additional controller to fit
Comfortable in use
Design can limit fitting to some bikes
The Ultimate Addons Premium Plus heated grips are wonderfully simple – just a pair of grips with a single switch on the left and wires running out of each, with connectors to the 4A fused main cable.
There are five power levels, though annoyingly the black and white instructions don’t tell you what the colours of the LED correspond to – they just show various shades of grey! The details are below, in case you’re wondering.
The Premium Plus grips incorporate an auto-shut-off function that cuts power to them if the battery drops below 11.5V for more than five seconds. This is low for a lead-acid battery, though potentially removing the current draw from the grips will see the measured voltage climb again. This is very low for a lithium battery, so I wouldn’t suggest using this feature if your bike’s fitted with one.
The best bet is to wire the Ultimate Addons Premium Plus heated grips to an ignition-switched supply, though do keep in mind that this will be feeding the full power to the grips, rather than acting as a switching signal, so make sure it can handle 3A in addition to whatever it’s supplying already.
A ring connector is crimped to the negative wire, but the positive is just trimmed and tinned, so you’ll either need to supply your own ring connector or tap if you’re not soldering it into a feed.
Most bikes will likely be able to supply the required power, though do take care selecting where you pick up from, especially on modern machines with CANbus. Many of these will have a dedicated auxiliary output, but Ultimate Addons specifically states that the grips should only be connected direct to the battery on modern BMWs.
While the grips should turn themselves off eventually when connected direct to the battery, a better bet would be to use a Hex ezCAN (reviewed here), or other power distributor like the Denali PowerHub or HealTech Thunderbox (neither of which we’ve tested).
Another potential limitation is that if your bike has a ride-by-wire throttle (which many do now), you should contact Ultimate Addons for advice due to varying sizes of throttle tubes and the potential for damage. Of course, you could ask your dealer and many will be able to carry out the work for you – apparently Suzuki dealers are happy to fit them for example.
Glue is supplied, but I didn’t find I needed it. In fact, after thoroughly cleaning the old glue off the bars with isopropyl alcohol, the fit was so tight on my 2001 Honda VFR800 that I had to ignore the instructions saying not to use a hammer. I placed a block of wood over the end of the grips then tapped them on using a wooden mallet. You must take care not to damage the grip itself or the throttle assembly (especially with ride-by-wire), so be very careful.
Fitting to the left bar was fairly easy, but the right took an awful lot of hammering. It might have been worth me sanding down the Honda’s throttle tube but I was reluctant to have to modify the bike in case I needed to test anything else in future.
The bigger problem, on this bike at least, was that there’s no recess in the Ultimate Addons grip for the ridge that’s on the throttle tube. This keeps the standard grip in place, and some aftermarket heated units do have a recess on the inside face of the right-hand grip, but to have got these properly seated I’d have needed to grind this flange off the original throttle tube, which I wasn’t willing to do so the grip sits slightly proud. It feels no different to ride with, but doesn’t look quite as neat as it could – it’d be great to see Ultimate Addons tweak the design for bikes that have a ridge.
Control
Press and hold the button on the left grip and the Ultimate Addons will power up in the last mode you used them in. From there, every time you tap it the power level will cycle through from high to low, then from low to high. The LED is bright enough to see in sunlight, though if you ever struggle you could just shield it easily with your hand.
Press and hold the button again to turn the grips off.
With winter gloves on I did at first keep turning the grips on by mistake due to the web between my thumb and forefinger pressing against the button, but after a few rides I just positioned my hand slightly to the left.
Blanking caps are supplied if you don’t have bar-end weights on the bike
These grips – which are the flagship among the Ultimate Addons range – have five heat levels, indicated by the colour of the LED embedded in the button on the left:
In use, of course my hands haven’t been scalded when using the grips at full power: the wind drags the heat away, but even at a standstill I was measuring surface temperatures of around 60°C outdoors at 13°C. The highest measurement I achieved was 75°C after leaving the bike running for an hour.
That’s not to say that these aren’t effective by any stretch – however the temperatures are measured, what really matters is how they perform on the bike and I’ve found they do a good job of keeping my hands nice and snug. I tend to use the highest level most of the time, but it’ll depend of course on the gloves you’re wearing. For most riders, Levels 3 to 5 will be the most used.
Can you use the Ultimate Addons heated grips with waterproof gloves?
Most waterproof membranes used in motorcycle gloves have microscopic holes that are too small to let water through, but will allow vapour from sweaty hands to pass from the warm environment inside the membrane to the cooler atmosphere outside. Heated grips can warm the moisture that becomes trapped in the glove’s outer, turning it into vapour that can then pass through the pores in the membrane and get to your skin. In Bennetts BikeSocial’s experience it’s only a potential issue for extended rides in particularly bad weather. Still, it’s worth being aware of this possibility. If you have heated grips and suspect your waterproof gloves are failing then you have a choice – warm damp hands or cold dry ones!
The lack of a recess in the right-hand grip means it butts up against the flange on the Honda’s throttle tube
If you want heated grips and you’re buying a new motorcycle then I’d recommend including them in the options if you can as the integration is usually more slick. However, there are some great kits on the market including these Ultimate Addons. Here are some others you might consider…
Oxford HotGrips Pro 2.0, £199.99 | We tested the previous version of the Oxford Hotgrips – which are made of silicone and have thermistors in the grips to properly regulate temperature – and found they offered great heat for winter rides, our tester preferring them to the factory-fitted ones that came with his KTM. The new 2.0 version has two more heat settings. Read the full review of the Oxford HotGrips Pro here.
Ultimate Addons Essential, £59.99 | A basic design with a separate controller, these are a very affordable option though we haven’t tested them yet.
Oxford HotGrips Premium, £79.99 |These are the older, simpler and cheaper model of Oxford heated grips, with five heat settings and a separate bar-mounted control unit. With many retailers selling these for £59.99 at the time of review, they cost £140 less than the Pro model. Read the full review of the Oxford HotGrips Premium here.
Ultimate Addons Premium, £129.99 | We haven’t tested these, but the main difference seems to be that the controller is positioned on the side of the grip, keeping it slightly more out of the way.
Oxford Hotgrips Advanced Integrated, £109.99 | We haven’t tested these, but like the Ultimate Addons Premium, the controller is also set just to the side of the grip, so something of a middle-ground between the Oxford Pro and the Oxford Premium.
Oxford HotGrips Wrap. £69.99 | Another product we haven’t tested, but these simply wrap over your existing grips. They still need wiring into the bike, but can be disconnected when not in use. They will of course add bulk to the grips.
These are just three of many alternatives – you can find all the heated kit we’ve tested here and be sure to regularly check for the discounts available through Bikesocial membership.
While the claimed temperatures seem a little optimistic, the Ultimate Addons have certainly been keeping my hands warm during long trips in winter on the 105,000 mile Honda VFR800.
These aren’t the cheapest heated grips but they’re also not the most expensive. The main improvement I’d like to see is a recess in the right grip to slip over the ridge that’s on many throttle tubes, which would make for a neater fitting without having to modify the bike.
If you ride in winter, or even if you suffer from poor circulation at any time of the year, a decent pair of heated grips are a very worthwhile investment.
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