The brand new Rivian R1T pickup is the fabulous EV glamping truck you didn’t know you wanted. This distinctive EV truck has every kind of options you want, plus just a few you by no means even considered. Come alongside on our check drive of the Rivian R1T and determine for your self if that is your subsequent day by day driver.
Proceed studying beneath
Our Featured Movies
What makes the Rivian R1T particular?
Rivian has been engaged on their EV pickup vehicles and SUVs for a number of years now, but it surely’s lastly right here. The primary rollout of Rivian EV vehicles is underway, and we received to drive the R1T pickup. The engineers at Rivian informed us this pickup has been totally over-engineered, and so they’re not kidding. From day by day driver duties to off-roading, this factor does all of it.
Associated: New EV Lynk & Co. drives into the US with a 4-year guarantee
The R1T is a pickup truck, an EV, an off-roading weekend automotive and even a tenting automobile. This one-of-a-kind electrical pickup has quite a lot of choices for street floor dealing with together with Preserve mode, Snow, Off-Highway, Sport and Normal operation. This enables the automobile to regulate suspension stiffness, save the battery, enable you to follow slippery roads and even increase or decrease the journey top for varied functions.
What we love concerning the R1T proper off the bat is that it’s versatile. You should use this truck to drive down some fairly tough roads and follow them. Nonetheless, in case you wrestle to discover a truck you will get out and in of with out hoisting your self as much as the peak of a horse saddle, the R1T has you lined.
Moreover, ingress and egress are simple. The middle console has a floor that can cost your iPhone wirelessly, plus a cordless Bluetooth speaker that pulls out from below the console to take you to the seaside.
What is actually spectacular about this truck is that it has all of the comforts of a day by day driver EV, together with a frunk (entrance trunk), electronically operated hood and rear gate and an air compressor constructed into the truck mattress to inflate your tires. It even has the well-known gear tunnel.
Flip your R1T right into a tent camper
This gear tunnel is a gap that goes instantly by way of the middle of the automobile between the cab and the truck mattress. It comes with some normal and a few non-obligatory options together with human and pet first assist kits and a helpful footstool or seat constructed into the door on all sides.
For an additional $6,000 (value topic to vary), you will get the tenting gear equipment that pulls a range, sink and prep counter out of the gear tunnel. This implies you could possibly use your Rivian for a commuter EV or work truck even in case you reside on tough roads, after which use it for tenting in addition to off-roading as an alternative of shopping for an RV or camper.
That’s the place the value begins to make sense. Rivian R1Ts vary from $60,000 to $95,000. Our version was tricked out to the tune of about $93,000, which isn’t any chump change. However take into account how a lot an RV prices ($100,000 to $300,000) or a tent camper pullout trailer ($60,000 to $100,000), now you see the truck does all of it. You possibly can drive the R1T to the native seaside, take it off-roading, then arrange for tent tenting at night time together with your pets. This factor can do absolutely anything an ordinary pickup can do, after which some.
Extras in a Rivian R1T
As we talked about beforehand, the engineers assured us they totally over-engineered the R1T. We have been joyful to find they did this within the nicest of the way. Each element is believed by way of. There’s a partial self-driving choice that helps with sustaining the next distance and lane steering.
You must drive a Rivian to understand how lux it’s. The flush door handles and facet mirrors open when your key fob approaches the automotive. A key card held over the motive force’s door or placing your foot on the brake whereas your key fob is within the automotive begins it robotically. The journey is easy, however in case you desire a stiff, sporty efficiency, it’s obtainable on the contact of a button.
The automobile stops you from doing something foolish, reminiscent of once we tried off-road driving and sped up an excessive amount of. The automotive merely dropped us again into normal driving mode and adjusted all of the settings to make that superb.
The R1T comes with tons of additional options, so that you may wish to mess around constructing out your choices earlier than ordering to determine which automobile is best for you. The tonneau cowl for the truck mattress is finest understood in particular person because it matches collectively like a jigsaw puzzle however works nice. You do must pay them a few thousand additional {dollars} to color your automotive something aside from silver. It provides up. However in case you construct out your superb automotive first, what you’re moving into.
Nonetheless, take one for a check drive if it’s obtainable. You’re going to like this factor. We dragged ours all over to run errands, ship recycling, choose up groceries and different purchases. We additionally drove it on dust and pavement and thru rain, on pavement and tough again roads. It dealt with all the things seamlessly.
The inside screens are designed after Tesla, however we like how there’s a separate display screen for the motive force show and the infotainment system. A whole lot of the know-how is made by Rivian only for this automobile line, so in case you like tech, take a look at a check drive to see all of the mapping and self-driving capabilities this automotive has, plus the chicken’s eye view digital camera that retains you out of bother in visitors.
Photos through Rivian
Editor’s Be aware: This overview isn’t sponsored by Rivian. All opinions on the automotive and firm are the writer’s personal.


