Ninja 400

Overview

The Ninja 400 is Kawasaki’s entry to the lightweight supersport class: a 399 cc liquid-cooled parallel twin with a 70.0 x 51.8 mm bore and stroke, an 11.5:1 compression ratio, dual 32 mm throttle bodies in a fuel-injection system, a six-speed gearbox and a high-tensile steel trellis frame. Kawasaki Motorcycles South Asia put it on sale in India during 2018 at a price reported at ₹4.69 lakh, took it out of showrooms for the BS-VI transition in 2020, brought it back in 2022 at a reported ₹4.99 lakh ex-showroom Delhi, and Indian press reported its discontinuation in May 2024. Kawasaki India’s Ninja 400 model page now returns a 404 and no Ninja 400 appears in the line-up the site publishes, which is why this record is marked discontinued.

The chassis figures are transcribed from Kawasaki’s own specification sheet for this generation in the United States market, with the imperial values converted: a 785 mm seat height (30.9 in), a 1,370 mm wheelbase (53.9 in), 140 mm of ground clearance (5.5 in), a 41 mm front fork with the Horizontal Back Link rear shock, 310 mm and 220 mm petal discs front and rear, and a kerb mass of 166 kg (366 lb) in ABS form. Rake and trail are stated there as 24.7 degrees and 3.6 inches. That sheet describes the same machine in another market, and MotoSutra publishes it as such rather than presenting a US number as an India-homologated one.

The power and torque rows are the weakest evidence on this page and are labelled accordingly. Kawasaki’s specification sheet for this model does not carry them, so the 47 bhp at 10,000 rpm and 38 Nm at 8,000 rpm printed here are MotoSutra catalogue estimates for the generation — the figures most widely carried in reporting on the bike, converted out of the metric units the market material uses. There is no top speed on this record and no mileage figure, because the desk holds neither, and Indian press reporting of a 0-100 km/h time for the Ninja 400 belongs to the publication that measured it rather than to MotoSutra.

The old MotoSutra Ninja 400 page is in the Internet Archive, and reading it explains two of the choices above. “Kawasaki Ninja 400 ABS 2021 Price, Top Speed, Specs, Review” went live on www.motosutra.in on 19 May 2021, was recaptured as late as 21 June 2024, and was rewritten under a /blog/ path that survives in captures of 14 October 2024 and 18 January 2025. It is filed as a review and carries a Rahul Singh byline, but its prose paraphrases an American road test — a motorcycle that “will do full interstate speed”, a machine “fully loaded” at 383 pounds — and its tables are Kawasaki’s United States specification sheet. That sheet is the same document the chassis row above transcribes, which is why the two agree on 41 mm telescopic forks with 4.7 in of travel, a 310 mm front and 220 mm rear disc, 110/70 and 150/60 tyres on 17-inch wheels, 24.7 degrees of rake, 3.6 in of trail and a kerb mass of 366 lb with ABS. It also carries a torque line and no power line, which is exactly the gap the estimate label exists to disclose, and it names ABS alone under rider aids.

One disagreement between that archived transcription and this record is worth stating rather than smoothing over. Kawasaki’s sheet renders the rear suspension as a bottom-link Uni-Trak with swingarm-adjustable preload and 5.1 in of travel; the hardware row above uses the horizontal back-link name Kawasaki applies to the same layout in its other market material. On the tank, the sheet says 3.7 US gallons, which is about 14 litres, and this record publishes no capacity because converting a US volume measure into an India-specification figure would present arithmetic as a specification. The “383 pounds” in the old page’s prose is another market’s road-test weight and no Kawasaki kerb figure, so it is not here either.

• 399 cc liquid-cooled parallel twin with a 70.0 x 51.8 mm bore and stroke and an 11.5:1 compression ratio
• 41 mm front fork, Horizontal Back Link rear shock and a trellis frame, on Kawasaki’s own specification sheet for this generation
• On sale in India from 2018 until reported discontinued in May 2024; Kawasaki India’s model page now 404s