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Can electric trucks breakthrough gas and diesel pickup loyalty?
Electric trucks haven’t yet made their way to the market, but plenty of them are announced. The big question is: Will EV trucks ever see the success that sedans and crossovers have? Can they be more popular than the gas and diesel trucks that are widely utilized across the world?
Pickup trucks are popular outside of the United States. In Canada, China, and even Australia, pickups are used by everyone from construction use to daily drivers. Their versatility as a luxury vehicle or a way to move large objects from one location to another makes them one of the more feasible types of vehicles available to consumers. For years, trucks have been listed as powerful, sturdy, and capable machines that have loyal consumer bases because of their adequacy for a wide range of activities.
But with the ongoing transition away from gas powertrains and toward electrification, trucks are simply next on the list to receive battery-powered operation. With several manufacturers releasing designs, pricing, and other variables for electric trucks, the question remains of whether or not the EV truck segment as a whole will be able to make a dent in the popularity of petrol-powered trucks in the future.
There seem to be several boundaries that EV trucks need to cross into to gain the trust and secure a sale to a driver who is interested in a truck but has their mind set on gas or diesel powertrains. I believe that one is going to be proving effectiveness in “work” settings like towing, off-roading, and hauling. The other is breaking through the brand loyalty that many truck buyers have with a certain manufacturer. Interestingly, it is tough to determine which will be harder for an EV truck maker to break, but it will likely be switching an owner away from their usual manufacturer.
Truck owners seem to hold a loyalty to their favorite manufacturer that is unmatched by owners of other segments. All too often, especially in my neck of the woods, I see and hear truck owners talking about why their manufacturer is the best, why others cannot seem to compare, and why they’ll never buy another brand of truck. Sometimes, you’ll even see the infamous bumper sticker of a kid peeing on a rival truck maker’s logo.
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But breaking a consumer away from a brand that they have put many years, and many dollars, into owning a certain vehicle is arguably one of the most difficult parts of selling cars. Past the production issues, which have plagued many car companies, Tesla included, for years, growing a brand is difficult. To have a consumer willingly switch brands is a tough task, and it usually relies on that company providing a massive shortcoming to that consumer in particular.
For example, bad customer service, poor quality, or even a political stance can cause a consumer to switch sides and consider other options. But these things are rare occurrences, so to really convince someone to try a different brand without any negative experiences really requires a product that makes someone go, “Wow, I need that.”
Credit: @KimPaquette | Twitter
Electric trucks certainly have the pizzazz and the appeal to make this happen. I would argue that the Cybertruck is probably the truck that will most likely drive more people to switch from gas or diesel-powered machines to electric ones. Simply because the design is so unique, many people may just be looking for something new that looks “tough” and “durable.” The Cybertruck certainly fits that bill.
However, the Rivian R1T has it’s own advantages too. Because of the fact that it has more of a “traditional” truck look, which is exactly what Tesla and Elon Musk were looking to avoid, it may be more fitting for many recurring truck buyers. It has the durability; it has the look, it has the options. It also is around the same price as many other trucks on the market, so the “too expensive” argument goes out of the window for those that still use it.
The next real test is proving durability and effectiveness. We have seen the Cybertruck pull the F-150 in a tug of war, but people still may be looking to see the vehicle perform normal everyday work. Same with the R1T.
The typical truck buyer is likely hauling things as small as 2x4s or as large as a boat. Before religious pickup buyers truly accept EV trucks, the manufacturers will have to prove that their products are capable of hauling normal, everyday things and large and difficult items. Performance and overall use capabilities will be proven before any truck buyers consider an electric option.
Please e-mail or tweet your thoughts about this subject. I am certainly interested in hearing what you all have to say about trucks and how EV makers can start making a dent in gas-powered pickup sales once deliveries begin. I think it will take more than a new, fresh, and fun way to drive a car to swing consumers to the “other side,” unlike it was with the sedan segment. Sedans are sedans, and they’re all pretty similar. I don’t believe there is as much brand loyalty on that side of things, but I could be wrong.
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Elon Musk
Elon Musk rips ABC News over fatal NYC Tesla crash report
Musk pushed back on NYC Tesla crash coverage, pointing to a pattern of premature blame.
Elon Musk pushed back overnight against media framing of a fatal Tesla crash in Midtown Manhattan, telling a user on X that “it wasn’t the car” and that the vehicle’s Autopilot system had nothing to do with the wreck.
The crash happened just before 3 a.m. Wednesday, when a 2024 Tesla Model Y struck a sidewalk shed outside 315 Madison Ave., a bus stop pole and a mailbox on East 42nd Street, according to the NYPD. The car kept moving several more blocks before stopping near Second Avenue. Both women inside, each 27, were taken to Bellevue Hospital, where the passenger was pronounced dead. The driver was charged with vehicular manslaughter, driving while ability impaired and leaving the scene of an accident.
Police have not attributed the crash to Autopilot or Full Self-Driving in any public statement. The charges point to impairment, not software. Musk’s response followed a since-deleted ABC News post that he said mischaracterized the incident. Replying to a user on X, Musk wrote that if Autopilot had been engaged, “they would not have crashed,” and added that “the legacy media will never forgive Tesla for failing to advertise with them,”
The legacy media will never forgive Tesla for failing to advertise with them
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 9, 2026
It’s a familiar cycle for Tesla. In June, headlines from several national outlets described a fatal crash in Katy, Texas, as happening while the car was “on autopilot,” based on the driver’s own account to police after his Model 3 struck a home and killed a 76-year-old woman. Tesla’s data told a different story when Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla’s head of AI, said the driver had pressed the accelerator to 100% and reached 73 mph in a residential zone. Harris County prosecutors later confirmed the human override and the driver was charged with manslaughter.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis pointed to that same Katy crash last month to argue that outlets routinely name Tesla in crash headlines while leaving other automakers unnamed, even after a driver’s own actions are shown to be the cause. A similar pattern played out in 2024, when Musk had to clarify that FSD was never even downloaded onto the Model 3 involved in a fatal Colorado DUI crash, despite a passenger’s claim that an “auto drive feature” was in use.
Tesla has not issued a separate statement on the Manhattan crash beyond Musk’s posts on X. The NYPD’s investigation is ongoing, and no cause for the driver losing control has been released.
Tesla’s two recently-defunct flagship models, the Model S and Model X, are getting a big upgrade, according to the company’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy.
Older Hardware 3 Model S and Model X vehicles have been the last major holdouts in Tesla’s Full Self-Driving v14 Lite rollout, and that wait now appears to be ending.
Tesla brings closure to flagship ‘sentimental’ models, Musk confirms
At Tesla’s Cybercab launch, AI chief Ashok Elluswamy told Ryan McCaffrey that he thought the S and X build “was supposed to go out last week.” Evidently, Elluswamy expects the suite to be rolled out to those HW3 Model S and Model X very soon:
For my @Tesla friends – and specifically Model S & X owners with HW3 who are waiting on FSD v14 Lite – I spoke to @aelluswamy at the Cybercab launch, & when I asked for an ETA on v14 Lite for S/X owners, he said, “Oh, I thought it was supposed to go out last week.”
So: soon! 🙌
— Ryan McCaffrey (@DMC_Ryan) September 7, 2026
Those cars are not the current Model S and Model X, which already ship with Hardware 4. They are the pre-refresh flagships built around Tesla’s older Autopilot computer, often called HW3 or AI3.
Tesla stopped putting that computer in new vehicles years ago, which is why owners treat these S and X cars as a closed generation. Model 3 and Model Y vehicles on the same computer began receiving v14 Lite in late June 2026 and saw a wider North American expansion in July. South Korea followed as an early international market. The S and X versions of the same software never joined that wave.
v14 Lite is Tesla’s way of squeezing the current v14 driving stack onto hardware that cannot run the full AI 4 model. The company describes the process as distillation: behaviors learned on the newer computer, including reinforcement learning and offline models, are compressed so the older chip and cameras can use them as a guide.
Early descriptions put the distilled network at roughly 15 percent of the original size. The result is still supervised Level 2 driving. Tesla has been clear that HW3 cannot support unsupervised Full Self-Driving or robotaxi operation because of memory and bandwidth limits.
The feature list is what made the wait so frustrating for S and X owners, as plenty of new features are to be shipped with it.
Official notes for the first Lite build, firmware 2026.20.5.1, added parking, unparking, and reversing; arrival options for a parking lot, street, driveway, or curbside; speed profiles that stay available at all times; and start-from-park engagement. Tesla also claimed better handling of merges, forks, pedestrians, traffic lights, and cut-ins, plus fewer false slowdowns and smoother lane centering.
A mid-July follow-on build, 2026.20.6.10, added more of the Hardware 4 interface, including a standalone Self-Driving app and the ability to start a trip from Park without a brake-pedal confirmation.
Elluswamy called that version the one “likely going to wide release.”
That wide release already reached most other HW3 cars in the United States and Canada. International timing still depends on regional validation and regulatory approval. For S and X owners, the remaining work appears to be model-specific validation rather than a new software stack.
There is no official Tesla changelog or build number for those two models yet, only Elluswamy’s offhand timeline. Some HW3 drivers who already have Lite report large gains over v12.6; others have described new indecision or phantom braking. The next test will be whether the same software lands cleanly on the older flagships that have waited the longest.
Yesterday, we reported on Tesla Cybertruck getting some major adjustments from a manufacturing standpoint in an effort to make the all-electric pickup more cost-effective, more reliable, more serviceable, and more easily produced.
Tesla Cybertruck engineer reveals new changes in ‘constantly evolving’ pickup
One of those changes was the addition of a self-reinforcing polypropylene aero shield that sits underneath the truck. Previously, Tesla utilized aluminum for this, but the self-reinforcing polypropylene was more durable while also being cheaper and lighter.
Tesla has revealed another small change it made to the Cybertruck, and it has to do with the side repeater cameras.
Tesla does not wait for a new model year to improve its vehicles. On September 8, Cybertruck lead engineer Wes Morrill posted side-by-side photos of an updated side repeater camera housing now rolling off the line at Gigafactory Texas.
The triangular camera pod mounted on the front fender looks almost identical at first glance. A closer look reveals a revised contour that uses the air already flowing around the truck to keep the lens clearer in rain and road spray.
The side repeater camera was updated – the version on the left is the newer part which uses passive geometry to create airflow disturbance that better keep water off the lens while driving. No cost penalty, just pure vision improvement. pic.twitter.com/wAbXtcL1Jf
— Wes (@wmorrill3) September 8, 2026
The side repeater cameras sit in an exposed position on the Cybertruck’s angular stainless-steel body.
In wet weather, they readily collect water droplets that can degrade the image Autopilot and Full Self-Driving use for lane changes and blind-spot monitoring. Early production trucks sometimes left owners wiping lenses by hand or accepting temporary restrictions on driver-assistance features.
Tesla has added washers to cameras on certain other models and on Cybercab prototypes, but those active systems add cost, complexity, and extra potential leak points.
The new housing solves the problem with passive geometry. Subtle changes in the surround create localized airflow disturbances as the vehicle moves. Those eddies physically push water droplets away from the optical surface. Morrill called the result “pure vision improvement” achieved at “no cost penalty.” Once the production mold is updated, every subsequent part costs the same as the original.
The advantages compound quickly. Clearer cameras in rain improve the reliability of driver-assistance features precisely when they are needed most. The design consumes no extra energy and introduces no new failure modes.
New Cybertrucks built after the tooling changeover receive the updated part automatically. Some owners of trucks delivered as late as June 2026 have already confirmed they received the revised housing. Retrofit questions have appeared in replies, and the cameras appear electrically compatible, though Tesla has not announced an official service program.
A few millimeters of reshaped housing will not make headlines the way a new battery pack does, but these changes are incremental and increase the Cybertruck’s effectiveness as a vehicle over time.
This improvement illustrates how Tesla continues to refine the Cybertruck after volume production began. Better wet-weather vision, zero added cost, and no extra hardware add up to a meaningful gain in everyday usability and safety.
Elon Musk rips ABC News over fatal NYC Tesla crash report
Tesla’s two defunct flagship models are getting a big upgrade
