The Maxus T90EV should have the segment almost all to itself in the UK, with the Tesla Cybertruck nowhere in sight.
Electric pickup trucks are certainly on a roll, but the US is not the only country where electric trucks are arriving on the scene. The UK received its first mass-market electric pickup this month, and predictably it's a little different than what we've started seeing here in the past year or so.
The electric pickup truck in question is the Maxus T90EV, produced by China's SAIC,
and it has landed in what would be considered the midsize category in
the US. It's a little smaller than the full-size best sellers here, and
it features an 88.5-kWh battery underneath. This gives the Maxus T90EV a
range of about 220 miles, which is not great for a battery this size. A
single 201-hp motor out back does the work.
The Maxus is not all-wheel-drive, and it's not really the longest-range EV out there when it comes to battery size. But its specs are aimed at other common on-road trucks of its size in the UK, which are neither excessively powerful nor require all-wheel drive.
The truck has an overall length of 211.2 inches, offers a payload capacity of 2204 pounds, and has a bed that is 58.4 wide, 59.4 inches long, and 20.8 inches high. The truck wears 17-inch allow wheels and offers LED daytime running lights. The interior, meanwhile, features a 10.25-inch touchscreen, along with six-way front power seats, but relatively few other comforts.
The price?
The Maxus T90EV starts at £49,950 in the UK, which translates to about $59,600, before any taxes or incentives. So it lands about $10,000 north of the entry-level F-150 Lightning in Pro trim, for example, which recently received a serious price hike. And it's not quite a Rivian competitor either, lacking all-wheel drive and luxury features.
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| Midsize pickups as lifestyle trucks are slowly becoming more popular in Europe, but in commercial applications they are still dwarfed by small vans. |
The UK pickup truck market and buyer expectations are unique, as something in this segment would probably be diesel powered. Relative to the US, the midsize truck segment is much smaller in the UK, and commercial vehicles used by contractors tend to be smaller vans. So the Maxus T90EV won't be landing in a red-hot segment, unlike in the US where pickup trucks are often the family car. For a European truck, SAIC won't have to worry about a whole slew of interior comfort features that are commonplace in the US.
It's worth noting that other automakers that have traditionally sold pickups in the UK and Europe are not in a rush to offer electric models, outside of some small-volume conversions, so the Maxus T90EV should have the whole segment pretty much to itself, at least in the UK.
But when it comes to light commercial vehicles, it should have plenty of competition from small battery-electric vans produced by Stellantis and others.
autoweek.com
