For years, America’s automakers have been engaged in an arms race to see who can build the largest, most complicated vehicle ever devised outside a Pentagon procurement contract. The average new pickup now costs enough to require financing, refinancing, and perhaps a brief consultation with a bankruptcy attorney.
Then along comes Slate with a startling proposition: What if a truck was affordable?
The Slate Truck Costs How Much?
Not affordable in the way airlines advertise tickets for $79 before adding $412 worth of fees; affordable as in $24,950. That’s the starting price for the Slate Truck, making it the least expensive new truck in America and possibly the first vehicle introduced this century with the revolutionary goal of leaving some money in the owner’s bank account.
The Slate philosophy begins with an idea that would get you laughed out of most automotive boardrooms: maybe people don’t need a rolling luxury condominium to haul mulch from the garden center. So, the Slate uses actual knobs and switches. Remember those? You turn them. They do things. No touchscreen menus. No software updates required to adjust the temperature.
Your Slate Truck, Your Choice
Even more shocking, the vehicle is designed around the notion that the owner might want some choice. Buy it as an SUV. Buy it as a pickup and convert it later into a Squareback and Fastback SUV. And because Americans have an almost constitutional right to bolt things onto vehicles, Slate offers more than 200 accessories through its marketplace, with more than 80% costing less than $500. That wouldn’t even buy the cupholders in certain luxury SUVs.
There are more than 100 wrap colors available. Want bright red? Fine. Matte green? Fine. Something that resembles a tropical fish suffering an identity crisis? Also fine. The wraps cost less than $500 and can be installed in hours rather than days.
Slate Truck By the Numbers
Yes, it’s electric. Before anyone starts hyperventilating, remember that electricity already powers your refrigerator, your television, your leaf blower, and the device you’re using to argue about electric vehicles on social media. The Slate’s electric drivetrain has a useful side effect: it eliminates hundreds of parts whose sole purpose is to eventually break at the least convenient moment possible. There are no oil changes. No spark plugs. No mysterious engine noises that sound expensive.
Instead, ownership anxiety shifts from the leak under the truck to is there enough charge, which admittedly, is progress of a distinctly modern kind.
Under the Slate Truck’s floor sits a 65-kWh Lithium Iron Phosphate battery pack feeding a single electric motor that sends 181 horsepower and 195 lb-ft of torque to the rear wheels. That’s enough bottled lightning to hustle the Slate from 0 to 60 mph in eight seconds, on its way to a top speed of 90 mph. Range is estimated at 205 miles, adequate for daily use, as long as it’s followed by a night of charging.
When the electrons do run low, replenishment takes about 14 hours from a standard household outlet, four hours from a 240-volt connection, or roughly 30 minutes with a DC fast charger. The truck uses the Tesla-style NACS charging port.
The truck is refreshingly truck-like. There’s a five-foot bed that holds 35 cubic feet of junk. It stretches to 6.725 feet with the tailgate down, while a seven-cubic-foot trunk resides up front. It has a 1,550-pound payload capacity and a 2,000-pound towing capacity. In other words, the Slate can perform actual truck duties instead of merely looking rugged while idling outside an artisanal coffee shop decorated with reclaimed wood furniture. Opt for the Slate SUV, and you’ll get 34 cubic feet of cargo space, or 58 cubic feet with the rear seats folded flat.Â
How the Slate Truck Differs From Other EVs
Modern vehicles often seem engineered under the assumption that owners should never touch them or even look directly at them without factory authorization. Slate’s approach is refreshingly old-fashioned. Many repairs can be done by owners themselves using guidance from something called Slate U. For jobs requiring professional help, owners have access to a nationwide network of more than 3,000 RepairPal shops and more than 100 facilities equipped for EV service. A 10-year, 110,000-mile battery and powertrain warranty helps too.
WHAT IS SLATE TRUCK?
The company was founded in 2022, primarily backed by Jeff Bezos with the unfashionable goal of simplifying manufacturing and building vehicles regular people can afford. Based in Troy, Michigan, the truck was designed and engineered in Michigan and California. Production will take place in Warsaw, Indiana, where Slate plans to invest nearly $400 million, create more than 2,000 jobs, and contribute billions to the state’s economy over the coming decades.
Preorders are open now. more than 180,000 reservation holders have already expressed interest. The cost is $300, or $250 for existing reservation holders who have already paid $50. Deliveries are expected to begin in the fourth quarter of 2026.
The Upshot
The Slate Truck won’t make your neighbors think you’re a venture capitalist. It won’t convince strangers that you’re conquering mountain ranges on weekends. What it might do is something far more unusual in modern America: provide useful transportation at a price ordinary people can still afford.
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