Ford created a shock smash hit when it launched the Maverick in 2021. This compact pickup, constructed on structure shared with the Escape and Bronco Sport crossover SUVs, provided truck functionality in a fuel-efficient, sensibly sized package deal. Now, Ford has launched updates for the 2025 mannequin 12 months that make the Maverick much more interesting.
At the start: Prospects will lastly have the ability to order the Maverick with the thrifty hybrid engine and all-wheel drive. Beforehand, Ford restricted the hybrid powertrain to front-wheel-drive fashions. This maximized gas effectivity, incomes stellar EPA estimates of 42 metropolis miles per gallon, 33 freeway, and 37 mixed. However this determination restricted the mannequin’s enchantment: Patrons who needed all-weather functionality or wanted to tow greater than the hybrid’s 1,500-pound most needed to improve to the two.0-liter EcoBoost four-cylinder engine, rated at 22 metropolis mpg, 29 freeway, and 25 mixed when paired with all-wheel drive.
“Hybrid all-wheel drive was by far the highest request from prospects,” Daybreak McKenzie, Ford Truck communications supervisor, advised WIRED through e-mail. McKenzie defined that within the preliminary rollout, the hybrid mannequin was restricted to front-wheel drive to maximise affordability—certainly, Ford promised a base price of $19,995 when the Maverick was launched for the 2022 mannequin 12 months, although for 2024 the most cost effective Maverick starts at $23,920, with the hybrid engine at present a $1,500 choice. Ford offered more than 94,000 Mavericks in 2023, over half of which had been hybrids.
PHOTOGRAPHY: FORD PRESS
For 2025, the Ford Maverick is available in a kaleidoscope of flavors. The bottom mannequin Maverick is a front-wheel-drive hybrid, rated at as much as 42 mpg. Including non-obligatory all-wheel drive is predicted to drop the gas financial system barely, to a still-respectable 40 metropolis mpg. (Official EPA scores haven’t but been launched.) An non-obligatory towing package deal, now accessible on hybrid Mavericks, permits trailers as much as 4,000 kilos. If the hybrid’s 191 horsepower and 155 foot-pounds of torque aren’t sufficient, the 238-hp, 275-foot-pound EcoBoost non-hybrid turbo four-cylinder remains to be accessible on all fashions.
Hybrid Pickups Choose Up
Hybrid pickup vehicles are form of having a second. Ford launched the hybrid F-150 PowerBoost within the 2021 mannequin 12 months. Toyota launched an optional hybrid drivetrain to the full-size Tundra pickup truck for 2022, and later this 12 months Ram will add a plug-in-hybrid to its light-duty truck. (Normal Motors doesn’t at present supply a hybrid model of the Chevy Silverado or GMC Sierra, although rumors indicate the automaker is scrambling so as to add a plug-in variant.)
By hybridizing their pickup vehicles, automakers appear to be spreading their bets. Total, electrical car gross sales are still climbing in the US, however once-skyrocketing year-over-year will increase are beginning to degree out. Within the pickup truck world, EVs are nonetheless a tiny area of interest. Ford is thrilled to level out that the all-electric F-150 Lightning is the best-selling full-size electric pickup truck in the US, with 2023 gross sales up 55 p.c in comparison with 2022. However the Lightning is vastly overshadowed by its personal inside combustion siblings: Ford offered more than 750,000 F-series pickup trucks in 2023, however solely barely greater than 3 p.c of them had been all-electric.
A number of components are at play. All-electric, full-size vehicles are drastically costlier than their inside combustion counterparts. The 2024 F-150 Lightning starts at almost $63,000, in comparison with $37,000 for a gasoline-burning mannequin; the base-model Chevy Silverado EV starts at roughly $75,000. The Rivian R1T starts at $70,000, and Tesla‘s promised $60,000 Cybertruck has just been canceled, that means you now cannot purchase one for a lot lower than $100,000.
