I Took My GMC Sierra EV on a Real-World Towing Test, and It Hands Down Outperforms Any Gas or Diesel Truck on the Market

The real issue is long distance. The time it takes to fill or replenish its power between fill ups.
I've struggled with buying one as I think they make sense in every way, other than this Achilles heal.
Now, if this was your second, third vehicle. No prob. But at 97 thousand dollars. And used around 85k..So the real question then becomes, How many would have a second vehicle?

Most enthusiasts don't have an issue with EV's. The technology is great. It is somewhat insulting reading article after article trying to convince us that out assessments are wrong or misguided. The reviews range estimates are wildly optimistic. Real world range on this truck with that heavy of a trailer is around 230 miles. So about 4 hours of driving. My guess is that range estimates off the dash are based off recent driving. The gas powered trucks are the same way. A full tank on the 3.0 liter diesel may say 600 miles of range. Hook a 8000 lb trailer up and you will get 300 miles. If however you only drive 60 miles with the trailer the range may say 400 miles of range left because it was averaging the no trailer and trailer miles.

For some 200 miles of range might be great. For a family going camping for the weekend 300 miles away this EV is not practical. Not to mention its $100,000. The same truck with a 3.0 liter diesel and the towing package is rated for 3000 more lbs and costs about $25k less. That completely neutralizes the cost to operate the diesel vs the EV and no range issues.

So he went pretty slow and not very far. That's impressive.

Going only 85 kilometers isn't a test. Everybody knows electric motors make more torque. The question is how long does the battery last?

The math doesn't work. 80 km from 25% of the battery would equal about 320 km if he used 100%. If he kept towing the same load he'd make it another ~240 km. I personally love EV's and have driven them for over 10 years, but I also think we should be reasonable about what they do well and what they don't. This sounds much more like an advertisement than like a factual account.

I think the editor must be on something, you can't tell me getting 43% of your maximum range towing is considered "good". That is a crazy efficiency loss compared to diesel, even gasoline wouldn't lose that much efficiency

Probably fine for a quick trip to a local lake. Not yet practical for a full day of driving and towing a travel trailer. Most charging facilities are pull in, so you either have to drop the trailer or stick way out. Plus the charge time is way longer than filling a tank. The technology will eventually get there, but until it is, it it isn't good for serious towing.

So he towed 80km and used about 200km worth of battery. His range is now halved from 750km to 375 km or 230 miles. This ev is most likely the extended range and starts at 92k. I'll stuck with a gas or diesel for about half that price.

Translated into miles, that's almost exactly 200 miles max range when towing. Which isn't bad, and will meet many people's short haul needs, often even for a round trip. If chargers are reasonably frequent that's about 3 hours of driving between stops on a long haul. My problem is that (where I drive), pull through charging stations are quite rare, which means you have to find somewhere to drop the trailer, go charge, and then hitch the trailer back up. I'd be interested to hear more about the hitch-up experience. I'd definitely want a rear camera that enabled you to line up the hitch in one try, and not fuss around. I'd also like to know the recharge time, day from 20-80%.

A 50 mile trip? I am glad your EV did well for you. I pulled a dump trailer full of green split oak that weighed every bit as much as the boat mentioned above last week about the exact same distance but through the hills of Southeast Tennessee and not just once but I made two trips and used less than a quarter tank of fuel. Had plenty of power, out of my 2015 F150 5.0L. Electric vehicles may work for some and for those that so choose hats off…but today’s EVs will not hold a candle to fuel burners when it comes to actual towing…. A 50 mile round trip hardly meets the criteria of a serious tow…

What I find odd about this post is the measurements. He uses liters and metric system measurements for everything but the weight of the boat and trailer. Lbs and not Kg.

I’m impressed by the performance but the math in the story is just wrong.
The author writes: Towing capability: A properly equipped GMC Sierra EV can tow up to 9,000 lbs while still retaining over 500 km of usable range.
This misstatement is due to the owner saying he got back from his trip with 555 km of range left. However, those are non-towing km’s.
He towed 80.7 km and used 25% of his battery. That means he can tow something less than 80.7 x 4 km in total. Since you will never tow to “0” let’s call it 300 km.
It’s not the 500+ claimed but I’m sill impressed!!

My ram has a exhaust brake and towes like a dream no white knuckles either have towed alot more then a puny 9000lbs and real numbers safer for the environment go try and huge a tree to feel better

"First, there’s the weight—9,000 lbs is no small load, especially when it includes a boat loaded with 550 liters of fuel. For context, that’s well into the range where even seasoned diesel 2500 drivers start paying close attention"

Stop it, modern 2500 diesels don't even breathe hard with 9000lbs.. heck 15000 is easy work. I know you are hyping electric, but don't tell tall tails. Glad your ev truck did so well but c'mon man.

"First, there’s the weight—9,000 lbs is no small load, especially when it includes a boat loaded with 550 liters of fuel. For context, that’s well into the range where even seasoned diesel 2500 drivers start paying close attention"

Stop it, modern 2500 diesels don't even breathe hard with 9000lbs.. heck 15000 is easy work. I know you are hyping electric, but don't tell tall tails. Glad your ev truck did so well but c'mon man.

A 2500HD Duramax is going to have about 50% more range pulling that same weight. Took about 3 minutes worth of research to figure that out. You can fuel it up anywhere in 5 minutes and even run bio fuel if you'd like. Conventional repair shops can fix them, and then there's the danger factor of sitting on top of a giant lithium battery. Keep pushing this trash on us.

This write up is deceptive, the numbers are in kilometers to give the impression of more range than we think as in USA we think in miles automatically. It's a marketing ploy review, nothing negative about the truck and it " implies " that it's better than the targeted Diesel . I've seen a lot of this discretely deceptive fake reviews as they are actually marketing .

50 miles at 65 mph, or 80.5 I'm at 105 kph, that left him 555 km range out of 740km, so he used 185km in 89.5km, twice what unloaded would have done and with a truck that weighs much more than standard 1500 explaining in part the stability. And the HP of that truck explains the speed stability uphill and regenerative down. Sounds like it did what it should, not so impressive? It's been many days since a 1500 series truck almost from anybody has been unable to tow 9000 lb.

So you're saying that boat holds like 140 gallons of fuel? And he only went like 100 miles? Yeah I wouldn't be bragging about that. My 97 f250 with a 460 goes that far, and still has half a tank on the small tank.

Everything's higher with kilometers, convert the numbers to English

Interesting. I wonder what the actual range towing 9000 lbs in mountainous terrain would be?

So it talks about long range driving however they drove 50 miles at 65 miles per hour, by a little calculation this range would just be around 200 miles before needing to recharge batteries, which means knowing where to stop for a recharge and the time to do so before complete drainage of batteries.

That's all well and good but how far did he actually drive???? From what I keep reading is that he went this fast and had this much mileage left at this speed ....I didn't see where the actual mileage is. I'm sorry but without that information I can only take this article with a grain of salt I'll stick with my ICE vehicle.