Mini bikes can be ridden on the street in some places as long as you get the mini bike street legal and go to the DMV to get the mini bike registered.
If you do not have the mini bike street legal then no you cannot ride the mini bike on the street even though it would be nice if you could.
However if you live in a rural area where there's not many houses or cars or police then you may get away with riding the mini bike down the rural road as long as you're careful and watch out for other vehicles.
But if you're in town then you can get into trouble easily for riding the mini bike if it's not legal to do so because neighbors could call in on you.
Yes dirt bikes are much faster in speed than quads or other ATV's.
Dirt Bikes are much lighter in weight than quads or ATV's so that makes them go much faster.
I once raced a friend with me on my dirt bike and him on his quad and I won and went much faster than him on his quad.
Dirt bikes also take curves much easier than quads as well.
Dirt bikes are not street legal and if you ride your dirt bike down a public street than you may get a ticket or at least a warning.
For the bike to be street legal it would need a tag which is registration and insurance on the dirt bike and most dirt bikes cannot be tagged or insured for the road.
So you need to stay off of roads with the dirt bike to avoid getting a ticket.
Dirt bikes are meant for riding down dirt roads that are not public and on land that is designated for dirt bikes and ATV's.
I have ridden my dirt bike down my street a few times to our store but I live in a small town and as long as I'm not riding the dirt bike in a bad way the police here really don't care about it.
But some places they will ticket you so be careful.
Dirt bikes are not hard to ride but they do require some practice to get to where you can safely ride the dirt bike.
It took me around 2 weeks to learn to ride a dirt bike where it took me around 2 months to learn to ride a motorcycle.
A motorcycle weighs more and is much harder to balance until you get the hang up it while a dirt bike is less in weight and is easier to balance and learn to ride.
If you can ride a motorcycle though you can easily ride a dirt bike.
My 8 year old son rides his dirt bike that is built for his size and he learned to ride that dirt bike in just 1 week of practice.
Now he rides that dirt bike all over the place in dirt bike friendly locations.
His Grandpa which is my dad has a farm with lots of land where he can ride his dirt bike on.
I go out there and ride my dirt bike along with him.