Rivian has officially launched the Design Studio online configurator for the R1T pickup and R1S SUV, and Teslarati got a first-hand look at the available options. Currently, the Design Studio is only available to pre-order customers and will be launched to the general public on November 23rd.
Rivian’s R1T starts at $67,500 and the R1S at $70,000. The Design Studio allows reservation holders and prospective buyers to design their vehicles’ interior and exterior, along with the battery pack and variant that they so choose to purchase.
The Rivian Design Studio is similar to any online ordering platform for a vehicle. The only difference is the manufacturer’s available options regarding aesthetics and performance, which are outlined below.
R1T Design Studio
The R1T Design Studio offers several different options initially, including choosing a specific build and increased battery pack allowing for more range.
Next, the reservation holder will choose the color of their R1T. My design studio choice was the $2,500 Compass Yellow option, which is unique and is accompanied by eight other possible colors. Additionally, the owner will have the choice of the 20″ All-Terrain or All-Terrain Dark wheels and tires, which run an extra $1,800 and $3,500, respectively. There are also Sport and Sport Dark packages that run for the same prices.
For the outdoorsy owner, the notorious Rivian Camp Kitchen is also available. The automaker will include an induction cooktop, a built-in sink, a 4-gallon water tank and pump, and a 30 piece cookware set for an additional $5,000.
Finally, the interior colors for the R1T include the Standard Black Mountain and two other options: Ocean Coast and Forest Edge. Ocean Coast is available at no extra cost, and Forest Edge will add $2,000 to the vehicle’s purchase price.
Finally, a Summary page describes all of your choices when your vehicle will be delivered and the estimated price. A $1,000 deposit is required to confirm your reservation.
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R1S Design Studio
The R1S Design Studio offers the same options as the R1T, without the increased battery pack.
The same color options are available, but since we chose the Launch Edition of the R1S, we have “Launch Green” available. The same colors are available for the R1T. The R1S has the same “Wheels and Tires” options, but they are depending on the package you choose. The wheel options are dependent on the package, not the vehicle, as the R1S has just as many options as the R1T in terms of wheel options. Also, sorry to the R1S owners who want to do some cooking in the great outdoors. The SUV will not have an option for the Camp Kitchen.
The same interior colors are also available to choose from, with the Forest Edge adding $2,000 to the price once again.
Finally, the Summary page greets the customer, describing options chosen, delivery dates, and the $1,o00 refundable deposit.
The R1T and R1S will begin deliveries for the “Launch Edition” in August and June 2021, respectively. The Design Studio will be open to the general public in just one week, so if you don’t have a reservation, you’ll be able to customize one of Rivian’s EVs on November 23rd.
SpaceX just picked up another $1.6 billion from the Pentagon, with the U.S. Space Force awarding two task orders worth $1.6 billion to fly 18 Falcon 9 missions from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California through the end of 2027. The launches will carry satellites for the Space Based Sensing and Targeting portfolio, a set of programs meant to help the military detect and track airborne threats and relay that information across forces in near real time.
The award falls under National Security Space Launch Phase 3 Lane 1, the Space Force’s faster, commercial style procurement track for missions that do not require the military’s most demanding certification process. It is also the largest single order publicly disclosed under that program so far, and the first task order issued since the Space Force nearly tripled Lane 1’s contract ceiling from $5.6 billion to $17 billion on July 17.
SpaceX to become America’s Military data backbone for missiles, drones, and warfighters
Eric Zarybnisky, the Space Force’s acting portfolio acquisition executive for space access, said the entire process, from identifying the requirement to signing the contract, took about two months, including a month set aside for companies to prepare proposals.
SpaceX is not just launching these satellites. It already holds the contracts to build two of the programs within the same portfolio, $4.16 billion for the Space Based Airborne Moving Target Indicator system and $2.29 billion for the Space Data Network Backbone, which Teslarati covered in May. That means SpaceX is now responsible for both building key pieces of the military’s next generation sensing network and getting them into orbit.
With this latest award, SpaceX’s Pentagon contract total for 2026 alone tops $8 billion, adding to a defense portfolio that already includes the Golden Dome missile defense software group SpaceX joined in April and a string of GPS launches it inherited after ULA’s Vulcan rocket ran into a booster anomaly, which we detailed in March.
Lane 1’s vendor pool technically includes seven companies: SpaceX, ULA, Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, Stoke Space, Impulse Space, and Relativity Space. In practice, SpaceX remains the only provider with the combination of launch cadence, flight proven Falcon 9 hardware, and West Coast infrastructure to support a campaign requiring roughly one Vandenberg launch a month for the next year and a half.
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Some lawmakers have flagged the growing concentration of national security launches with one company as a risk worth watching. For now, the Space Force keeps backing SpaceX, with it being the company that shows up ready to launch.
Elon Musk shed two new bits of detail on Starship following its 13th test launch, which was an overwhelming success.
SpaceX launched Starship for the 13th time last Friday after two delays: one on Monday when several Raptor engines did not ignite, and another on Thursday due to unfavorable weather conditions in Starbase, Texas.
The launch was overwhelmingly successful. SpaceX was able to complete a necessary test of the heat shield tiles by increasing the acceleration of Starship from launch throughout the flight; 20 Starlink v3 satellites were released with no issue; the Super Heavy Booster landed safely in the Gulf of America, Ship successfully reignited engines while in space; and it also splashed down without incident in the Indian Ocean.
SpaceX Starship just nailed something it’s never done before
Nevertheless, more details are coming out about Starship, and Musk is doing the talking.
Starship Will Be Retrieved in the Ocean
Musk revealed on Tuesday night that Starship would be recovered by a ship in the Indian Ocean. SpaceX routinely tries to recover Starship after splashdown in an effort to find out more about the flight by examining the spacecraft afterward.
We’re sending a ship out to recover Starship https://t.co/fUqUZTITO9
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 28, 2026
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This helps engineers find out more about why things might have happened, allows them to examine any potential damage or anomalies that might have occurred, and increases the chances of an even more successful flight next time thanks to the additional information recovered.
Ship Could Have Been Caught by Tower Arms, Musk claims
Musk has already indicated that SpaceX will plan to attempt a catch of Starship with the 14th test flight. While this would be a major accomplishment, it would be an expected next step, considering the fact that the Super Heavy Booster has already been caught by the chopsticks on numerous occasions.
The ship landing was precise, meaning that it would have been caught by the tower arms https://t.co/6nbNrRfX9P
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 29, 2026
A ship catch would be a great indication of where SpaceX stands in terms of reusability and launch cadence. A successful catch with relatively no incidents would be a good sign that SpaceX is nearing a more frequent launch of Starship, but also that the reusability of the massive rocket would be something many would expect in the near future.
It is a necessity to make life multiplanetary.
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Elon Musk has updated his timeline for when humans will walk on Mars and for when ships will simply get there.
The objective of getting to Mars has been one of Musk’s biggest goals since becoming a serial entrepreneur and realizing that time on Earth is limited. Musk has said several times he hopes to die on Mars, and not by impact.
Musk now believes that people will be on Mars in “roughly 5 to 7 years.” He said that a Mars lander will get there “a few years sooner.”
People on Mars in roughly 5 to 7 years.
Mars lander a few years sooner.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 29, 2026
The response from Musk comes after NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said that SpaceX’s biggest priority is the Moon and not Mars. Because of this, Isaacman conceded that he believes nuclear power and propulsion investments will provide “potentially the pathway with the fewest miracles required to put four people on Mars in the next 10 to 15 years.”
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Of course, this is what NASA can do through taxpayer funding and nuclear investments, he added.
Musk’s grand ambitions are much more optimistic than most, and it is certainly a double-edged sword. This is not the first time timelines for Mars have been somewhat lofty, especially to those normal thinkers like you and me, not super geniuses like Musk.
In fact, the SpaceX and Tesla frontman has said on at least a dozen occasions that we could be on Mars in the coming years. Musk said 2020 would be the big year as early as 2009. In 2020, he was “highly confident” of a landing in 2026, and had even said 2024 in a best-case scenario.
The point is, the range has varied, and it’s anyone’s guess when we’ll get there. This latest adjustment to the timeline is typical of Musk, and while the Moon has seemingly taken priority over Mars, it is still worth mentioning that the ultimate goal is to make life multiplanetary, and it starts potentially with the Red Planet.
SpaceX scores another massive Pentagon deal to support military satellites
Elon Musk sheds two new bits of detail on Starship after 13th test launch
