The 2025 Ram 1500 REV’s Massive Weight Could Push Past EPA’s Light-Duty Rules

Ram’s electric pickup truck will be so heavy that it may skip federal crash and range testing.

byJames Gilboy|
2025 Ram 1500 REV front three-quarters
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The 2025 Ram 1500 REV has only just been revealed, and we've already spotted something curious: Flat side mirrors. They may not sound like a big deal, but they may tell us a ton about the electric Ram pickup.

Compared to the Ford F-150 Lightning and Chevy Silverado EV, the Ram claims the most range of any electric pickup, with 500-plus miles on a charge. It achieves that range with a gargantuan 229-kWh battery, almost 15% bigger than the one in the 2024 GMC Hummer EV. It may stretch even farther with a range extender that uses an onboard generator.

All this battery and motor probably makes the Ram REV awfully heavy—so heavy that it may be classified as a medium-duty truck. That could have inconvenient implications for owners, starting with those flat mirrors.

2025 Ram 1500 REV back seat speakers. Ram

Like the Hummer before it, the Ram REV has flat "unit magnification" style mirrors, a type of mirror meant to portray the vehicle's dimensions to the driver accurately. Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard 111 requires them on vehicles with a gross vehicle weight rating—that's curb weight plus max payload—of more than 10,000 pounds. (They're also legal for lighter classes, but convex mirrors are more common for visibility. Hence, cutouts in the REV's mirrors probably house convex mirrors.)

These mirrors likely indicate a maximum GVWR above 10,000 pounds, which pushes it into Class 3 medium-duty truck territory. (Ram for its part, calls the REV "light-duty," but various sources disagree on whether Class 3s are light- or medium-duty. Semantics.) Regardless of word choice, the weight introduces another problem: range.

Ram claims more than 500 miles from the REV's biggest battery, but that claim may never be verified by independent EPA testing. Like the Hummer, crossing the 10,000-pound threshold would exempt the REV from federal testing by the EPA. (ICE Class 3 trucks don't get tested for gas mileage either.)

That's not the only federal test the Ram 1500 REV might get to skip, either. The NHTSA doesn't crash-test three-quarter-ton pickups like the Ram 3500, or for that matter, its electric equivalents. That goes for the Hummer EV (not tested), and may go for the Ram 1500 REV too.

With that said, the REV may still be crash tested and receive EPA range estimates—just probably not on the max-range trim. A Ram spokesperson told us that while the truck at the New York auto show this week has a production body, it's not the max-range, 500-mile version. That implies a lighter model that could limbo into Class 2B like the Rivian R1T, which does have an EPA range estimate. If the Ram REV is light enough to get into Class 2A, like the 2023 Ford F-150 Lightning, it would have some semblance of crash-testing. A little, anyway.

One thing the Ram probably won't have to do is stop for weigh stations like many Class 3s do. That applies to commercial vehicles only, and unless a REV is registered as a promotional vehicle, it won't be bought for business reasons: Its 5-foot-7 bed is too small to qualify for Section 179 tax deductions, and the production model doesn't have the concept's bed pass-through that might let Ram argue "it's bigger than it looks."

All this is superfluous given the kind of person who will buy the 2025 Ram 1500 REV, though. If you're buying what'll probably be a $100,000 electric truck based on its manufacturer's range claim alone, you're probably not the type to take independent range testing—or crash testing—into account. Like the Hummer and Rivian, the Ram 1500 REV is likely to initially be more of a statement and a toy than a tool.

Got a tip or question for the author? You can reach them here: james@thedrive.com

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