Nissan launches electric pickup truck with 250-mile range and nutty price through JV in China

While we are impatiently waiting for Tesla, Rivian, and others to bring their electric pickup trucks to market here in North America, China is already getting some.

Nissan is launching a new electric pickup truck through a Dongfeng joint venture in China: the Dongfeng Rich 6 EV.

With its aggressive zero-emission mandate, China has forced automakers to accelerate their deployment of all-electric vehicles in the country.

Several of them are now making EVs just for the Chinese market.

Nissan is one of them and with their joint venture with state-owned Dongfeng, they are launching an all-electric version of their Dongfeng Rich pickup truck.

The gasoline version is based on Nissan’s pickup truck platform and it has been converted to an electric powertrain.

Here are some pictures of the Dongfeng Rich 6 EV electric pickup truck via Car News China:

The Dongfeng Rich 6 EV is relatively compact (5290/1850/1790 wth a 3050 wheelbase) wth a small bed (1510/1562/475) and it has curb weight of 1,983 kg (4,370 lbs) with a max load of 490 kg (1,080 lbs).

Its double cabin can seat 5 people.

As for the powertrain, it is equipped with a single 160 hp/420 Nm electric motor and a 68 kWh battery pack.

Dongfeng claims a range of 403 km (250 miles) on a single charge, but that’s using the NEDC standard, which is generally nowhere near a normal use case.

The top speed is 110 km/h (68 mph) and the company says that it is fast-charging capable. Without confirming the max charge rate, Dongfeng says that it takes 45 minutes to get to 80% state-of-charge.

The Dongfeng Rich 6 EV should hit the market as soon as next month. The price is unknown, but it is expected to be extremely cheap — maybe even 130,000 yuan ($18,900 USD) after subsidies.

Electrek’s Take

China gets all the fun stuff.

Granted, the specs are not that impressive and it’s certainly not something that would convince most pickup truck owners to go electric, but it’s a decent start, especially at that price.

If they can double the energy capacity and increase charging speed without doubling the price, they would have a killer product for most pickup truck markets.

I wouldn’t be surprised if they get there in a few years just in time for Tesla and Rivian to launch their own more high-end electric pickup trucks.