A Tesla Cybertruck range test has resulted in only 103 miles (166 km) of range, but it was performed in the worst conditions possible.
As we reported earlier this week, the first independent tests of the Cybertrucks are starting to come in, and people seem to be particularly interested in the towing range of the new electric pickup truck.
In one of the first tests, we saw the Cybertruck get about 160 miles of range towing roughly 6,000 lbs in decent conditions.
Now, we get a much tougher independent test.
Youtuber JerryRigEverything tested the Cybertruck range while towing 11,000 lbs, the truck’s towing limit, in freezing weather. Here’s the video:
He is towing a Hummer, which is known to be not the most aerodynamic vehicle to say the least, but it is still more aerodynamic than most popular box trailers.
What were the results?
The Youtuber was able to drive the Cybertruck 90 miles using 108 kWh for an average of 1,193 Wh per mile:
I have been driving electric vehicles for a decade and love hyper-efficient vehicles, which is why it is hard for me to look at an EV getting over 1 kWh of energy used per mile, but I know there must be some of those to do the hard mileage.
Now, Zach from JerryRigEverything wisely didn’t drive the truck to 0% state-of-charge. There were still 2% of the battery left.
The Cybertruck’s battery pack is about 123 kWh of energy capacity. At an average of 1,193 Wh, it means the vehicle could have driven about another 10 miles before dying.
Update: a commenter had a good point below. The truck was garaged before getting hooking up to the trailer and starting the test. That helped compensate for the loss of range from the cold temperature significantly. Therefore, the conditions could have been worse.
Electrek’s Take
I like this test. It’s a useful near-worst-case scenario to have on the books. I say near-worst-case because you could get a less aerodynamic box trailer and you could get colder temperatures than this.
But for the most part, you should be able to tow significant loads under the 11,000 lbs limit and travel more than 100 miles (160 km) on a charge, which is not great, but it covers a lot of use cases.
Based on the first independent range tests, it looks like the Cybertruck is nowhere near as great as Tesla made their fans expect, but it is also not as bad as Tesla haters made it up to be.
What a surprise! The truth stands somewhere between the two extremes.
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