The Milwaukee-Eight Era: How Harley's Engine Changed From 2020 to 2025

Between 2020 and 2025 Harley's best-selling motorcycle changed engines once, dropped about $2,000 in price, and lost 16 lb. The story of the Milwaukee-Eight in those six years is the story of the 117 moving down the range until it was standard equipment. There is also a footnote about published torque that is worth more attention than it usually gets.

The 114 Years

For MY2020 through MY2023 the volume Harley was the Street Glide Special on the Milwaukee-Eight 114, 1868cc, air-cooled. Seat height 26.1 inches laden and 27.2 unladen, 827 lb in running order. The base Vivid Black price ran $27,699 in 2020, $27,099 in 2021, $27,449 in 2022 and $27,999 in 2023, excluding freight. Four model years, one engine, no mechanical change worth listing.

That stability is the point. Harley sold the same drivetrain into its highest-volume slot for four consecutive years while the rest of the lineup was being rebuilt around it. Whatever else the company was doing, the touring platform was not being experimented on.

The Torque Figure That Changed Without the Engine Changing

Harley's published output for the M8 114 in 2020 was roughly 122 to 123 lb-ft at about 3,000 rpm. From MY2021, the published figure for the same engine became 118 lb-ft at 3,250 rpm. Nothing was removed from the motor. The published measurement changed.

This matters beyond trivia. Put those two numbers in a table and the 2021 bike looks like it lost five pound feet overnight, which is how a good deal of secondhand comparison content ends up wrong. It is also a useful reminder about what a manufacturer figure is: a number produced under a stated procedure, published for marketing and regulatory purposes, and revised when the procedure or the reporting convention changes. It is not a measurement of your bike.

Anyone building a spec comparison across MY2020 and MY2021 has two honest options: footnote the change, or leave the 2020 figure out. Printing both side by side without explanation is the one option that misleads.

2022: The 117 Escapes CVO

January 2022 brought the Street Glide ST and the Road Glide ST, and with them the first appearance of the Milwaukee-Eight 117 outside CVO. Until that point the larger engine had been the reason to spend CVO money. After it, a buyer could have the 117 in a standard-range motorcycle.

The volume bike did not get it. The Street Glide Special stayed on the 114 for two more model years while the 117 was proven at the top of the range. That sequencing, big engine into a limited-run variant first and into the volume bike later, is the whole shape of the Milwaukee-Eight era in one decision. Our 2022 Harley best seller post covers what else moved that year, including the end of the air-cooled Sportster 883 and 1200 in North America.

2024: The 117 Becomes the Standard Engine

The MY2024 Street Glide and Road Glide redesign is where the era turns. Harley described it as the most comprehensive product development in the touring platform in well over 10 years, and the specification changed accordingly: Milwaukee-Eight 117, 1923cc, 130 lb-ft at 3,250 rpm and 105 hp, a 12.3-inch TFT display on Skyline OS, four ride modes, rear travel up to 3 inches, and a claimed 60 percent average reduction in helmet buffeting.

Weight came down from 827 lb to 811 lb. Unladen seat height went up, 27.2 inches to 28.1, while laden height stayed at 26.1. And the price went the direction almost nobody expected: $25,999 in Vivid Black, roughly $2,000 below the outgoing Special, with freight around $850 on top.

Harley's own account of the result, from its FY2024 release, is that the launch of the new Street Glide and Road Glide contributed to nearly 5 percent growth in the US Touring segment and drove the company's market share to 74.5 percent. That is a segment figure, not a model figure. Harley-Davidson publishes no model-level unit sales, and neither does Polaris for Indian or Honda for the US market. BMW Motorrad is the only one of the four that does. Our 2024 Harley best seller post goes through what that share number does and does not establish.

What the Bigger Engine Actually Bought

From 118 lb-ft at 3,250 rpm to 130 lb-ft at 3,250 rpm is a 12 lb-ft gain at identical revs, on 55cc more displacement. The peak did not move up the rev range, which is the interesting part. Harley added torque without asking the rider to change anything about how the bike is ridden, and on an 811 lb motorcycle that arrives as easier roll-on rather than as more speed.

The 105 hp figure is the one to keep in perspective. This is not an engine sold on power, and the four model years of 114 that preceded it were not short of engine either. What the 117 changed is the size of the margin, and how much of the range gets it as standard.

Owners of the 114 bikes are not left with a problem, incidentally. Their complaints are consistent across the era and mostly not about output: engine heat on the right leg at stops leads every list, followed by the stock seat. Those are collected in our Street Glide 114 owner reports.

2025: The Price Comes Back

For MY2025 the motorcycle carried over unchanged, same 117, same 130 lb-ft, same 811 lb, and the base price went to $27,749, up $1,750. Harley flagged weakness in the Touring category in the first half of that year, with customer traffic declining and affordability becoming more of a focus. Both of those things happened in the same twelve months.

A Street Glide Ultra was added at $30,749 and four CVO models sat above the range. The 2024 price, in hindsight, was the outlier rather than the new normal.

A Note on Throttle Feel

An engine that makes its peak torque at 3,250 rpm is ridden with small throttle movements, and small throttle movements are felt through glove material more than through anything else you wear. Riders coming off a lighter bike often find a heavy winter glove blunts exactly the inputs the M8 rewards. Legendary USA's US-made motorcycle glove range is a reasonable reference for seeing how much weight separates a summer glove from a cold-weather one before you commit.

What This Means for a Buyer Today

If you are shopping used, the 2021 to 2023 Street Glide Specials are the same motorcycle three times over: M8 114, 118 lb-ft at 3,250, 827 lb. Buy on condition, history and price, because the model year buys you paint. The 2021 bike at $27,099 new was the cheapest of the three.

If you want the 117 without CVO money and without the 2024 redesign, the 2022 and 2023 ST models are the route, and they are rarer. If you want the 117 as standard equipment on the redesigned chassis, MY2024 is both the first year and the cheapest year it existed.

And if you are comparing torque figures across 2020 and 2021 on a listing site, check whether the seller has understood the published-figure change. It is a small thing, but it is the fastest way to work out how carefully the rest of the advert was written.

Six model years, one engine change, and one number that moved on paper without moving in the metal. The Milwaukee-Eight era is a good argument for reading footnotes.

Cover photo: "Harley-Davidson Street Glide parked at Hogs for Hospice, Leamington, Ontario, 2025-08-02 04" by Chris Woodrich, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.