Ford F-150 Lightning 300-Mile Range Rating Might Be Conservative

Marques Brownlee's first look at the Ford F-150 Lightning all-electric pickup includes an interesting note about the range, that potentially it might be conservative.

Ford released only brief info about the expected EPA range, without sharing battery capacity:

• Standard-Range Battery with expected EPA range of 230 miles (370 km)
• Extended-Range Battery with expected EPA range of 300 miles (483 km)

However, according to what Marques Brownlee's learned from Ford, the 300 miles of range is an expected value with 1,000 lbs (454 kg) of cargo. It means that an empty truck might offer a higher range.

The other finding is that the demo truck, with an empty trunk, displayed 367 miles (591 km) of remaining range at about 80% State of Charge (SOC), although the SOC indicator was only a graphical chart so it's just a guess. At 100% it would be then 459 miles (739 km)!

Well, we seriously doubt that the range will be so high, although in some cases - optimum conditions, with no load, and at low speeds - results above 400 miles (for the Extended-Range Battery version) would not be surprising.

Our estimated battery capacity of the Ford F-150 Lightning (using the charging time guidance) is:

• Standard-Range Battery 115 kWh net/125 kWh total
• Extended-Range Battery 155 kWh net/170 kWh total
  

That's really a lot of energy, and considering low-speed driving - that does not require that much energy - it might translate into a high range. The demo truck potentially was driven rather slowly, and probably estimated a high remaining range taking into account the most recent energy consumption.

Anyway, it would be nice to get a slightly higher EPA range and real-world range than the initial 300 miles.

See also

Ford Announces F-150 Lightning Pro For Commercial Customers

Ford F-150 Lightning Everything We Know: EV Specs, Prices