Slate Auto Announces $24,950 Starting Price for Electric Truck

Slate Auto Announces $24,950 Starting Price for Electric Truck Slate Auto is betting that American car buyers will sacrifice features and range for price, launching a bare-bones electric pickup it says will be the cheapest EV in the U.S. market at $24,950 before fees.

Early vision: Cheapest EV, radically simple

Slate’s debut truck was pitched from the start as a “radically simple” EV designed around cost, not tech-laden luxury, with the company confirming a $24,950 base price for the pickup and $29,950 for the SUV variant. To hit that figure, Slate stripped out many features now considered standard: no touchscreen, no stereo or speakers, a phone mount on the dash instead, and manual crank windows.

Reviewers note this runs directly against decades of “more-features, bigger-screens” competition in the auto industry, with Slate instead offering “a genuinely basic new vehicle that doesn’t look that way.”

Battery pivot: From NMC to LFP

Behind the scenes, the company was also rethinking its battery strategy. Initially planning to use nickel‑manganese‑cobalt (NMC) cells, Slate switched to cheaper lithium‑iron‑phosphate (LFP) packs as the U.S. battery market shifted and LFP costs fell about 40% relative to NMC. The move became more viable after U.S. tax credit rules changed, removing penalties for using batteries tied to China’s LFP-dominated supply chain.

That allowed Slate to cancel a planned 240‑mile option, while boosting the standard pack from 150 to 205 miles of range, still within its low-price target.

First rides: Better than promised, but questions remain

Hands-on impressions suggest Slate may be underpromising and overdelivering. Early specs for the base truck—180 miles of range, 1,000‑lb tow rating—have been upgraded to 205 miles and 2,000 lbs, with payload rising from 1,400 to 1,550 lbs. One reviewer riding in a pre-production model reported that, despite the cost-cutting, “it doesn’t feel cheap,” citing smooth acceleration and solid ride quality.

Still, analysts say the real test lies ahead: whether value-conscious buyers embrace a deliberately minimalist EV, and whether the Jeff Bezos‑backed startup can scale production of what it calls “so much more than an affordable truck.”

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