I absolutely love the Aventon Pace 500.3 e-bike. As I noted in my review, it's a solid all-around bike, powerful enough for experienced riders, but friendly enough for beginners. If this is your first e-bike, there are a few things you should do before you hop onto it and start riding.While the Aventon Pace 500.3 is ready to hit the road as soon as it is assembled and charged, if you want to get the most out of your new ride, you should take a few minutes to pair your bike with the Aventon app and customize the settings. Changing things like the screen brightness and the measurement units is helpful, but you'll probably be most interested in setting your ride's top speed. Understanding the Aventon Pace 500.3 dashboardBefore I get into the bike and the app's menus and settings, let's take a moment to understand the Paces dashboard controls. They're easy to grasp at a glance and comparable to those you'll see on most e-bikes, but if this is a your first time, there are a couple things worth noting. Credit: Stephen Johnson Here's a breakdown of what each button on the panel on the left handlebar does:The + and - keys control the level of pedal assist, from one to five. (A higher number equals more assistance.)The left and right arrows control the turn signals.The center button is power.The switch is the throttle: push it downward to go. That's all pretty basic, but there are a couple of less obvious things you can do here too:Long press the up arrow to turn on the headlight on and off.Hold down the + and - keys at the same time to bring up the settings menu.How to change settings from the Pace 500.3 dashboard Credit: Stephen Johnson There's not a ton of customization available to you from the handlebars, but if you want your display to read "kilometers" instead of "miles" this is the spot to change it. For most other changes, you'll have to pair your bike with Aventon's app first. Here's how to do it:Choose "connect to app" from the on-bike menu screenYou should see a QR code. Scan the code, download the app, and make your account.Once you've paired your bike with your app once, they should connect automatically every time. The app is not necessary for riding the bike, and if you don't use it for a while, the bike should "fill in" the miles and other information from your rides since the last time you synced the two.How to change the top speed of an Aventon Pace 500.3To change the top speed of an Aventon 500.3, you need to use the menus in the app. You can set your top speed anywhere between 12 and 28 miles per hour., but before you make a choice, look into e-bike laws in your locality.There are three basic classifications of e-bikes, and how they work is a little convoluted:Class 1 e-bike are pedal assist only and top out at 20 mph. Class 2 e-bikes have a throttle and pedal assist and a speed limit of 20 mph. Class 3 e-bikes have a top speed of 28 mph, and are technically pedal-assist only, though in practice, many or even most class 3 e-bikes let you use either a throttle or pedal assist up 20 mph, then limit you to pedal assist for the last 8mph.Most places in the U.S. (but not everywhere) allow class 3 e-bikes to ride wherever analog bikes can legally go.. The Aventon Pace 500.3 is a class 3 e-bike, but it doesn't come configured that way. Out of the box, the top speed is set at 20 mph, and you need to use the app if you want to raise it to 28or lower it for that matter.Once you know what's legal, here's how to change the top speed on your Aventon Pace.Sign onto the app. Credit: Stephen Johnson Click "settings" underneath the front wheel to bring up this menu: Credit: Stephen Johnson Click "Speed Limit and Metric" and you can set your bike's speed from anywhere between 12 mph and 28 mph. That's about it when it comes to changing settings on the Aventon Pace 500.3If you're into tinkering around with your e-bike, the Pace 500.3 might disappoint you. While some other brands allow users to get more granular and change things like the size of the wheel or the torque level of the throttle, altering those settings isn't possible for users of the Pace 500.3.