The Slate truck's base price is just $255 more than a base Honda Civic. Electric vehicle startup Slate Autos emerged out of the blue last year with a simple premise: to offer a highly configurable American-made EV truck at a very low price. The specifics of that price, however, remained a mystery well after the truck's April 2025 debut—with the mystery only deepening after the federal government axed the electric vehicle tax credit that Slate had said it had been expecting in order to put its inaugural product in buyers' hands for less than $20,000.
Well, Slate has finally pulled back the curtain on the truck's cost ... or at least, it's pulled it back most of the way. On Wednesday, the automaker revealed that the basic version of its product, the two-door pickup version known as "The Blank Slate," will start at $24,950 before destination fee. The "Squareback SUV" variant begins at $29,950 before destination, while the O.J.-Bronco-esque "Fastback SUV" kicks off at $31,950 before the fee.
View Price on AmazonHere's the caveat, though: we here at Road & Track have a policy of always including destination in the quoted price of a new car, because, well, it's part of the price of a new car. As such, we can't say for sure what the true take-home cost of a Slate will be just yet. The automaker's website merely says the quoted cost "excludes taxes, title, license, registration, governmental fees, destination charges, documentation fees, and any optional equipment;" our colleagues at Car and Driver report that Slate says the fees will be "minimal," which we'd guess means less than four figures, in order to keep the actual base price under the $26,000 mark.
Of course, body style choice is only the jumping-off point for customization, and the list of options honestly makes Porsche's online configurator look spartan. Adding a wrap (the only way to officially change up the colorway, as all Slates start out, er, slate gray) starts at $499.99 for full body coverage, less for partial wraps. There's an extensive array of colorful decals that run from $59.99 to $589.99. A spare tire carrier on the tail runs $549.99, while a set of all-terrain tires. Inside, if you want built-in speakers, you'll need to fork over at least $249.99; power windows aren't on the menu for the moment, however. And all the items can, at least in theory, be added onto the truck by the buyer after purchase.
Slate did share one other note of exciting news Wednesday: updates and changes to the truck's battery now mean that the pack has grown from 53 kWh to 63 kWh, and can deliver up to a claimed 205 miles of range, a marked increase from the original estimate of 150 miles. The truck's NACS port is Tesla Supercharger-compatible, so at least finding a place to test the company's claimed 30-minute 20-percent-to-80-percent fast-charging time shouldn't be hard.
Source: roadandtrack.com
