All About the New Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL9 Frame on Zwift

Today, Zwift released a rare out-of-cycle game update (v1.116.2) for the sole purpose of unveiling one of the most anticipated new road bikes of 2026: the S-Works Tarmac SL9 from Specialized:

(Today’s release also includes the new Roval Rapid Sprint CLX wheels, which we’ll review in a separate post.)

The S-Works SL8 is already the most popular bike in the Zwift race peloton, with an impressive real-life WorldTour palmares to match. But how does the new model compare to other bikes on Zwift?

You’ll need to be updated to game version 1.116.2+ to see this bike in the Drop Shop. You’ll also need to be at level 40+ with 1,900,000 Drops to buy it. Here’s how it’s described in game:

The all-new S-Works Tarmac SL9 is the fastest road bike ever made. Not just because it’s the lightest. Not just because it’s our most aero. But because it delivers the lowest real-world Time to Finish of any road bike. Validated across real race courses, terrain, and riders. When the goal is to cross the line first, no road bike gets you there faster.

See our master list of all frames in Zwift >

It’s rated 3 stars for aero and 4 stars for weight, like other top all-arounders on Zwift. But that’s actually a sizeable group of bikes at this point. So how does it actually perform? Since Zwift’s 4-star system isn’t the most granular performance metric, we ran this frame through our precise tests to measure performance in nerd-level detail. Let’s dive in!

Note: test results below are from a 75kg, 183cm rider holding 300W steady using Zwift’s stock 32mm Carbon wheelset on the un-upgraded version of the frame, unless otherwise noted.

Aero (Flat/Rolling) Performance

Across an hour of flat riding, the new Tarmac trims around 1 second off the S-Works SL8’s flat time, making it the new fastest all-arounder in game.

The frame’s time puts it 63 seconds ahead of our baseline frame across an hour of riding, which means it’s just 0.5 seconds behind the current aero king, the new Cervelo S5, which was also released this week.

Note: these results will change when Zwift gives the SL9 a “polish” in an upcoming release… more on this below.

Climb Performance

The SL8 was a very strong climber – the best climbing road bike in game, in fact, when comparing un-upgraded bikes. (The Specialized Aethos S-Works at stage 5 is far and away the best climbing bike in game, though, handily beating the S-Works Tarmac SL8 at stage 5.)

While the new SL9 weighs essentially the same as the S8, we expected the SL9 would perform at least as well as the SL8, if not a bit better due to aero improvements. And it does!

The frame’s climb test time puts it 57.7 seconds ahead of the baseline frame after an hour, which is basically the same time as the Tarmac SL8 and ~2 seconds ahead of the lightweight new Cannondale SuperSix EVO LAB71 Team.

Upgrading Your Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL9

Like all frames in Zwift, the Tarmac SL9 can be upgraded in five stages. It uses the Distance, High-End upgrading scheme, giving it the following characteristics:

Performance At Each Upgrade Stage

This chart shows how many seconds this frame will save across 1 hour of riding compared to our stage 0 baseline frames (Zwift Carbon or TT). This is based on a 75kg rider, 183cm tall, at 300 watts, riding on tarmac.

Upgrade Stages (Distance, High-End)

1. 200km: Aero Upgrade for 100k Drops
2. 260km: Weight Upgrade for 200k Drops
3. 320km: Drivetrain Upgrade for 350k Drops
4. 380km: Aero Upgrade for 500k Drops
5. 440km: Weight Upgrade for 750k Drops

Conclusions

The S-Works SL8 was already the most popular bike among Zwift racers. I predict the SL9 will supersede it in popularity, although Zwifters will have to put in some significant miles to upgrade their new SL9 so it beats their fully upgraded SL8.

Specialized claims a 3.8-watt savings for the SL9 vs the SL8 when riding at 45kph. That may not sound like much, but it’s actually quite massive in Zwift terms. Specialized says that savings translates to 14 seconds saved across an hour of riding. In our tests at 300 watts, which works out to around 40kph on flat ground, we’ve found that a 3.8 watt difference works out to around 23 seconds saved on Zwift.

But Zwift can’t exactly set up the SL9 so it trims 23 seconds (or even just 14 seconds) off the SL8’s flat time, can they? It would blow away their game design, which has a handful of top frames performing within 1-3 seconds of each other. So instead, Zwift is looking to make the SL9 just 1-2 seconds faster than the SL8 on flats, while keeping it the same weight so its climbing performance isn’t much different from the SL8.

One interesting related tidbit: the SL9, as it appears in game today, is actually a touch slower than Zwift wants it to be. Sources within Zwift tell me the bike will be receiving a slight “polish” in the coming weeks, which will be noted in the release notes. This should make the bike approximately 1 second faster on the flats.

The long and short of it is: the new Specialized S-Works Tarmac SL9 beats the S-Works SL8 on Zwift, and it will even get a bit faster in the coming weeks. With the SL8 already ranked #1 in our list of Top 10 Road Bikes, the SL9’s performance is big news for Zwift racers. And I, for one, am glad to see it. Because I’m tired of seeing so many white bikes in the peloton!

We’ll be adding this bike to the following posts soon:

• Zwift Shopping Guide: What To Buy from the Drop Shop at Each Level
• The Top 10 Road Bikes in Zwift
• Zwift Speed Tests: Frame Ranking Charts
• Speed Tests: Concept Z1 (Tron) Bike vs Top Performers (Un-Upgraded and Fully Upgraded Versions)
• A Complete List of Zwift Bike Frames (added)

Questions or comments?

What do you think of Specialized’s new Tarmac in Zwift? Share below…