Until recently, the Ford E-Transit was the only game in town if you wanted a fully electric delivery van and didn’t work for Amazon. But 2024 is shaping up to be a battle royale of electrified delivery vans, and the latest entry is the Ram ProMaster EV, unveiled Tuesday and expected to begin deliveries in just a few weeks. When it arrives, it’ll be head-to-head not only with the Ford, but other recent arrivals including the BrightDrop Zevo, Mercedes-Benz eSprinter and Rivian EDV.
On paper, the ProMaster EV looks like a Goldilocks option among these rivals, but it will cost more than some of them. It’ll offer 162 miles of range in city driving from a 110 kWh battery, 268 horsepower and 302 pound-feet of torque, up to 3,020 pounds of payload capacity and up 524 cubic-feet of cargo volume. Plus, it carries over many of the traits and options fleet operators like about the gas-powered ProMaster, a staple of companies like Amazon, FedEx and many subcontractors who deliver for them.
Ram says there will ultimately be five ProMaster EV configurations, including two roof heights, two cargo lengths (12 and 13.5 feet) and two body styles, but for now only one has a price. That’s the $79,990 (including a $1,995 destination fee) Delivery model, which offers 2,030 pounds of payload but a specialized roll-up rear door and curbside pocket door. A Cargo trim with conventional doors will soon follow, possibly at a lower price.
That’s a whole lot more than $53,835 E-Transit Cargo van or the gas-powered ProMaster ($46,955), but less than Rivian’s EDV. In a sense though, the biggest surprise is that Ram is only launching this van now. It’s been on sale in Europe as the Fiat E-Ducato since 2021, shortly before the E-Transit came online.
ProMaster EVolution
From a fleet buyer’s perspective, one major advantage of a van like the ProMaster EV is that it requires little or no adaptation from its gas-powered counterpart. It will look and feel almost identical, if quieter, and the design is already well-proven. Indeed, the design, closely based on the third-generation Fiat Ducato dates back to 2006.
The big van has been sold under many different brand names in Europe for years, including Toyota and fellow Stellantis brands Citroën, Peugeot, Opel and Vauxhall. It came to Ram (née Dodge) dealerships in 2013 as a belated replacement for the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter, which was sold by Dodge when it was part of DaimlerChrysler.
Unlike its main rivals, the Transit and Sprinter, the ProMaster is a front-wheel drive design only, with no rear-wheel or four-wheel drive configurations, and this will also be true of the EV, which mounts its electric motor on the front axle.
This makes it less popular as a go-anywhere “VanLife” Instagram star than the Sprinter and provides fewer configuration options than the Transit, but it has many advantages in terms of crafting a delivery van. It simplifies construction, helps upfitters who customize commercial vans by placing all of the important components ahead of the driver and allows for an even larger cargo area.
Surprisingly, there’s also a history of electrification around this vehicle. Fiat experimented with an electric Ducato in the 1990s and the ProMaster has been repeatedly adapted into an electric van here in the U.S. by third-party converters. Just as Amazon partnered with Rivian on the EDV van, Fiat partnered with express company DHL to develop the E-Ducato, with deliveries beginning in late 2021. The Italian version offers two battery pack options, 47 and 79 kWh.
What Ram is offering now is a cut above those earlier efforts and falls neatly between many of its rivals. Among them, only BrightDrop is still selling only to large commercial fleets and only delivered 164 vans last year, but Rivian announced in November that it would make its previously Amazon-exclusive EDV available to private buyers in 2024 as the EDV 500 and stretched EDV 700.
ProMaster EV Vs. The Rest
While 162 miles of range from a 110 kWh battery pack doesn’t sound like a lot, vehicles like this are used almost exclusively in short-range stop-and-go situations (the ideal use of an electric powertrain) and usually return to bases where they can easily be recharged. The E-Transit has only 126 miles of range, while the eSprinter should come in around 200. The EDV 500 maxes out at 161 miles.
Juicing the ProMaster EV should also be fairly painless, as it’ll charge at up to 150 kW where the Transit and eSprinter are limited to 115 kW maximum rates. Technically, the Ram has four levels of charging capability, 50, 85, 125 and 150 kW, but whether it costs to upgrade to the faster rates isn’t yet clear. At Mercedes, 50 kW is standard and 115 kW is optional. The Rivian can charge at up to 100 kW.
The E-Transit offers up to 3,880 pounds of payload and 487.3 cubic-feet of volume while the eSprinter maxes out at 2,664 and 488. Rivian’s EDV 500 offers 2,734 pounds and 487 cubic-feet, while the ProMaster EV Cargo counters with 3,020 and 524. The Promaster EV Delivery offers only 2,030 pounds of payload.
Payload capacity might less important than volume for last-mile delivery operators though. Express shippers and e-commerce delivery operators tend to pack their vans (and planes) full of stuff, but it’s generally not very dense stuff. Boxes full of packing material aren’t the same as hauling around heavy machinery. The extra room in the ProMaster, including its best-in-class 86 inches of interior cargo height, could make a difference if the price isn’t too high.
The 280-hp ProMaster EV will offer power levels similar to the gas version, which uses a 286-hp V6, and the commonality of so many parts will no doubt appeal to fleet customers. Mercedes offers 134 or 201-hp eSprinters while the E-Transit gets 275 hp, but exact stats on the EDV are still to come. The Mercedes costs a little less than the ProMaster EV, but the EDV starts at $83,000.
ProMaster EV Features
Virtually all of the features of the gas ProMaster carry over onto the EV, including its infotainment and driver assistance systems and some are standard on the initial Delivery version.
To help preserve energy, the optional heated windshield and steering wheel from the gas version are standard on the Delivery. It’ll also come with Ram Telematics, which enables real-time vehicle diagnostics and performance data for tracking performance and boosting efficiency. There are also Over the Air firmware updates, a Wi-Fi hotspot, Apps Over the Air (AOTA), and the van can provide walking directions to a final destination via a smartphone app.
While big, basic vans aren’t known for their long lists of safety gear, the ProMaster EV now includes front and rear parking sensors with automatic braking, two separate backup alarms, forward collision warnings, crosswind assist, post-collision braking, a driver alertness monitor, traffic sign recognition and automatic high beams. Options include a full suite of active-safety systems like adaptive cruise control with lane keep assist, though how useful those are in a delivery van is open for debate. More helpful is a 360-degree camera system.
The 10.1-inch upgraded infotainment display from the gas ProMaster is standard here, and runs Stellantis’ latest Uconnect 5 software, with navigation and over-the-air updates (beyond firmware). ProMaster EV also comes with a charging location detector and “EV Dynamic Trip Prediction” which is a fancy term for EV route planning assist, to help you locate fast chargers, though again, most vans like this have routes planned by somebody other than the driver.
Customers can order their ProMaster EV Delivery right now, with the vans expected to begin arriving at dealerships in Q2. The less specialized Cargo models will follow this spring and summer. They aren’t as flashy as the other EVs Ram has in the pipeline, like the much-hyped Ram 1500 REV and Ram 1500 Ramcharger, but they’ll definitely arrive in your neighborhood first.