Early on, electric cars were small, lightweight economy cars that had a maximum range of about a hundred miles, and that only under very specific circumstances. In 2021, though, the electric vehicle (EV) marketplace has exploded, and in the coming years, automakers are going to offer an even wider field of vehicles, including trucks like the GMC Hummer EV, the Ford F-150 Lightning, and the Rivian R1T and R1S. As vehicles get larger and more utilitarian, the question naturally ventures from “How much will I save in fuel?” to “How much can I tow with this vehicle?” There are some distinct pros and cons to towing with the current and future crops of EVs, and some things to look out for as you make your next vehicle purchase decision.
Towing Basics
In order to work as a tow car, your EV is going to need a few things:
A trailer light wiring harness: Most vehicles these days are pre-wired for a plug-in trailer light wiring harness. You simply purchase it from your car dealer or an aftermarket supplier, find the plug—often located behind a trim panel in the cargo area—and plug it in. The end of the wiring harness plugs in to the wiring plug on the trailer.
A trailer hitch: These days, most people are using a receiver hitch, in which the hitch ball and tongue slide into a square tube. That allows the hitch ball to be removed so you don’t bash your shins on it every time you unload something out of the cargo area. Most EVs are going to use a Class I, II or III hitch, based on the weight they’re rated to tow.
The important things to understand here are receiver size (the size of the tube the hitch ball and tongue slips into), gross trailer weight (the weight of the trailer and its contents) and tongue weight (the amount of weight measured at the trailer’s tongue).
Hitch Class
Vehicles meant for towing often include a trailer hitch receiver from the factory. But if your vehicle doesn't have one, don't fret: these can be installed after the fact. Hitches come in three classes, based on the amount of weight their designed to tow. Here's a handy chart to help explain the three classes:
Vehicle Specifications
Your best bet when starting to research whether a vehicle is suitable for towing is to check with the manufacturer. Every manufacturer will provide a towing capacity, if that vehicle is in fact rated to tow a trailer. If it’s not rated to tow, sometimes the manufacturer will indicate this with a “Not Recommended” rating.
Not always, though. A good example is the Ford Mustang Mach-E, which has specifications listed in a pull-down menu showing every trim level side-by side. Except, “Towing Capacity” isn’t listed as a specification. Nor is the towing capacity listed in the technical specifications on Ford’s media site. You’re left to just assume that the Mustang Mach-E isn’t rated for towing.
Tesla doesn’t have a “Specifications” page listed anywhere, but it does provide towing capacity on the landing page for models like the Tesla Model X.
There’s also wild variation in the information out there online. For example, a Google search for “Jaguar I-PACE Towing Capacity” returns a result of 5,291 pounds, but that’s data provided by a retailer. Nowhere in Jaguar USA’s consumer website, nor in the specifications listed on the media site, does Jaguar claim a towing capacity at all.
Coming Soon
There’ve been a lot of slideware, renderings, and videos of upcoming vehicles that are much more suitable for towing. Trucks like the GMC Hummer EV, the Rivian R1T and R1S, and the Ford F-150 Lightning are all purported to be delivered within the next 12 months, and all of them are suggesting some pretty serious towing numbers.
Or not. 100 percent of these vehicles are “coming soon” at the moment, with on-sale dates that seem to be on a sliding scale.
GMC hasn’t released any towing capability numbers at the time of this writing, on a vehicle that’s supposed to be ready for delivery at some point in 2021. Ford’s media site lists gross trailer weight rating of 10,000 pounds for the F-150 Lightning, and suggests a delivery date of “spring 2022.” Rivian cites 11,000 pounds for the R1T pickup and 7,700 for the R1S SUV, but delays have pushed the release back to August of 2021. Tesla cites 7,500 pounds plus for the Tesla Cybertruck but doesn’t appear to be any closer to production than it was when Elon Musk put a brick through the “unbreakable” window at the press launch.
The Pros and Cons of Towing With an EV
The biggest advantage an electric truck has over a truck with a gas or diesel engine is how torque is delivered. Even with a diesel engine like the Cummins in a 2021 RAM 3500, peak torque is 1,075 lb-ft, which it reaches at 1,356 RPM. The Cummins has a wide, flat torque curve, which is good, but by 2,000 RPM, torque begins to fall off. And the engine produces very little torque at idle. A dyno sheet shows the Cummins producing around 200 lb-ft of torque at idle.
That’s not how an electric motor works. Electric motors deliver maximum torque at all times, no matter how quickly or slowly the motor turns. The GMC Hummer EV, for example, has total peak motor torque of 1,045-lb-ft. That number is only nominally better than the biggest diesel that RAM offers, but that torque is available from the second you step on the accelerator, not after the diesel engine’s turbo has had a chance to spool up.
Electric motors also have a torque advantage at any speed. If you step on the accelerator at highway speed in a RAM with a Cummins diesel, for example, if the engine is turning at 3,000 RPM, the maximum torque has fallen off significantly. That’s why truck manufacturers include tow/haul buttons on the transmission: to keep the engine turning in a specific band of RPM where torque is highest. With an electric motor, that maximum torque is always available, with zero tailpipe emissions.
Electric trucks also have the dual advantages of regenerative braking a lot fewer parts in the powertrain sapping the power that the motor provides. A diesel engine requires a transmission, a driveshaft and a rear differential, where an electric truck just runs power straight to a wheel motor. Want four-wheel drive? Add more motors.
The disadvantage, of course, is the impact hauling a trailer at highway speed has on range. In 2020, the Audi e-tron SUV towed a 4,000 pound trailer on a 504 mile trip between Tulsa, Oklahoma, and Austin, Texas. It averaged 60 MPH in 35-degree temperatures. Car and Driver calculated its maximum range at just 105 miles towing a trailer. Unladen, the e-tron showed a 190-mile range in tests from the same publication.
Internal combustion engines have the same issue. In very general terms, you can expect that when towing a 4,000-lb trailer—about the size of your average camper—your MPG is going to be cut in half. 18 MPG averages can pretty quickly be cut to the single digits with a travel trailer in tow. But the big consideration when you need a long range is, how much time is it going to take you to get back on the road? In the worst case with a diesel engine, you might have to pull off the highway at an exit and find a fuel station, but that might take you a maximum of 15 minutes, even if you visit the restroom and buy a pack of Ho-Hos and a Moxie at the convenience store.
In an EV, replenishing the battery to get the next hundred miles behind you is at least a 90-minute procedure, but that’s with a Level 3 charger on something small, like the 62kWh battery pack in a Nissan Leaf Plus. The Rivian R1T electric pickup has a 135kWh battery pack. At 50kWh, a Level 3 charger would take two hours and 42 minutes to charge the Rivian R1T from 10 percent capacity to 100 percent capacity. That’s about twice as long at the charger as you’ll spend driving to get to the next charging station.
The Bottom Line
At the moment, the prospect for towing—even a flatbed, even with the latest crop of EV trucks coming online in the next year—appears to be for local trips only. Longer distances will require a lot of stops along the way. Plug-in hybrid vehicles may be the answer for the short term. The Chrysler Pacifica PHEV, for example, has a 3,600-pound towing capacity, will run on the electric motor when you're at your destination, but as a hybrid car, it also allows you to fill up conveniently in minutes along the way.
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