Zander Drives Cars

Let’s get one thing very, very clear before we start: The GMC HUMMER EV is a showcase, not a car. This 9,000 lb, 1000 hp, truck exists to shut people up, not to be a daily. General Motors, as an American company, has a unique responsibility to cater to both changing trends and its “patriotic” audience. Because of that, the road to electrify for them has been difficult. How do you convince people that EVs, those silent, soulless beasts, are just as cool as your classic big ol’ US warship? Well, you become a stereotype of yourself, and go all out. This is the peak of American excess. This is the highest point of the mountain, and that mountain is strange.

The Exterior

The GMC HUMMER EV SUT (I’m just going to call it the “Hummer”) commands presence. This thing makes a Suburban look like a Tercel. The obscene chunkiness of this truck is unmistakable, whether you like it or not. Do you want some dimensions? Well, here you go: 216.8 inches long, 87 inches wide, and 79 inches high. I’d do the conversions for the rest of the world, but I feel like this truck would disapprove of me doing so. While this truck is technically smaller than a full-sized Sierra 1500 crew cab, like the one I drove last month, if you asked people to say which one was bigger, you’d get “the white one.” Aside from that, it is both wider and taller than the aforementioned Sierra 1500, too.

Oh, and there’s removable roof panels, too, as if you need more space in this truck, which brings me nicely along to:

The Interior

I would like to point out, by the dubs, that at 6’2, I had to hoist myself into this behemoth using both the side steps and the grab handle. Way to make me look like a short king, GMC.

Like the massiveness of the exterior, the interior is just as cavernous. In every single seat, you have miles and miles of head, leg, arm, foot, and all types of body room at your disposal. Even with the front seat decently far back (I’m 6’2, for reference), you still get Mercedes levels of rear legroom. You can man-spread back here with almost no physical pushback from your fellow rear-seat passengers. Because this is a GMC, technically, you also get the standard front armrest with tons of storage, as well as a cool Volvo-style passageway under the center console. Speaking of that passageway, it is covered in a topographical scan of the moon like the speakers and floormats. Oh, GM, you know how to gimmick so well.

Like a lot of new EV trucks, the Hummer does a great job at both looking premium and utilitarian at the same time. It is also important to note that this is an “Edition 1” truck. This means that you get plenty of gold (or is it bronze?) painted accents on the doors and seats, as well as a plaque on the front passenger side of the dashboard. While I recognize that GM trying to market this truck as “utilitarian” does give them leeway to use some lesser materials, the vinyl door panels felt a bit cheap and outdated, contrary to what other funky door cards that different brands like Hyundai and Volvo throw out.

The Screen

The Hummer EV has a screen that, functionally, I’m a big fan of. The layout is very uncomplicated, with only a few large icons on the home screen, and its 13.4-inch display is about as large as screens can get before they become overly obnoxious. That being said, because there is so much gimmicky nonsense stored on this screen, it is a bit laggy. Expect a second or so delay between when you press “media,” and when the screen switches. That gimmicky nonsense takes the form of the fully animated driving animation that plays when you switch drive modes. You have such gems as “a rainy street,” “the moon,” “Mars,” and “rocks.” I know these all have proper names, but it’s more fun to call it like I see it.

The Tech & Features

As I said before, the Hummer EV does its best to come off as “utilitarian” and “tough.” That being said, there is plenty of technology and features here to keep you happy and entertained. Aside from all the gimmicky stuff like crab walk and “Extrack Mode,” the Hummer EV does come with quite a lot of useful and semi-useful stuff, including, but not limited to:

heated and ventilated front seats with heated outboard seats, a heated steering wheel, wireless phone charging, USB-A/USB-C ports everywhere, tri-zone climate control, Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, adaptive cruise control with Super Cruise, a 360-degree camera with a rear-view mirror camera, forward collision warning, a full BLIS system (you’re going to need it), and an automatic parking assist.

Obviously, there is a lot more “stuff” on this truck, but that’s the most important stuff.

The Bed

Let’s start with something I don’t like: this tonneau cover. Realistically, do you ever see yourself in a position where you would need to haul something in the bed of this truck? No, you don’t. All this cover does for me is make it super difficult to take pictures because I’m too dumb to figure out how to take it off. Ugh.

Anyway, like most GM products, the Hummer EV is equipped with the fun, yet sometimes confusing, MultiPro tailgate. I appreciate that it has a built-in speaker system and plenty of outlets as well. But, this is a big but: the bed size is non-standard (5 feet, compared to the Sierra’s 5.8-foot bed), which gives this truck another knock on its real-world capability. Also, because this truck sits so high up, it can be difficult to lift things in even with the help of the aforementioned MultiPro. Yes, you can have the suspension go lower, but that’s just another step you need to take to load in plywood, which again, you won’t ever do in this truck.

The Specs

The 2023 GMC HUMMER EV SUT starts at $87,000. This price does go north very quickly when you throw in options and when you factor in markups. The truck that I drove is currently for sale for $146,00. That now makes it the most expensive EV truck on the market, at least until Elon does something dumber, which he will.

As driving specs, the HUMEMR EV is powered by four electric motors combined, 212 kwh), making 1000 hp, and 11,500 lb-ft of torque, but this has been disputed heavily, with real numbers placing it anywhere between 700-800 lb-ft. This truck needs that power and torque, though, because, at 9,400 lbs, it is one of the heaviest vehicles on sale in the United States today. But, and this is the single craziest part of this truck, even with all that weight, the HUMMER EV will hit 60 mph in 3 seconds. This is “supercar” level of acceleration in a vehicle that is the size of a small country.

As for battery stuff, the HUMMER EV has a claimed range of 330 miles. I’ve seen numbers range anywhere from 270 to 315, but I wasn’t in it long enough to give you my own estimate, which I recognize isn’t good journalism, but there’s only so much I’m capable of. As for charging, GMC says that you can get “up to 100 miles of range in 10 minutes,” which doesn’t help me find a standard 20%-80% charge time. That being said, expect sometime over a whole hour to actually get that charge from a standard 350 kwh charger. Ouch.

The Conclusion

Look, this is an impractical vehicle in every situation. If you want an electric truck to do truck things, get an F-150 Lightning, and if you want a truck that shows off but actually has some capability, a Rivian R1T is perfectly fine.

This is a big, expensive, ridiculous piece of technology that exists because GM has to show people that EVs aren’t what The Simpsons said they were 30 years ago. If you’re looking at the HUMMER EV through the lens of “a truck,” you’re going to be disappointed. But, if you look at it as an “obtuse halo car that really shouldn’t be taken seriously,” you can learn to love it, even if you’ll never use crab walk.

Big thank you to Anderson GMC and Buick for letting me come down and bother them about the HUMMER EV. They have a huge selection of GMC and Buick models and have a few of these on the lot as of writing this article. Click here to view their inventory.