Ford Ranger

What We Like

Enjoyable powertrain The Ranger’s base 2.3-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine carries over from the outgoing model and is similar to the Bronco’s more powerful base engine. It produces a healthy 270 hp and 310 lb.-ft. of torque. For the most part it performs well, and it has a notably more cultured sound than other turbo-fours in the midsized segment. It takes off from a stop with nary a delay, and there’s good, accessible power available when you need it. There are times, though, when the turbo-four delivers power more suddenly than you might expect; it isn’t always in tune with your right foot’s pressure on the gas pedal.

Most shifts from the 10-speed automatic transmission are smooth, beyond a bumpy one-two upshift when you’re getting going. As with most transmissions, the Ranger’s 10-speed wants to get into a tall gear quickly for fuel economy purposes. Luckily, just a mild extra tip-in of the gas pedal brings a quick downshift to aid acceleration. And although the engine will lug at low revs at times, the Ranger’s turbo-four doesn’t suffer from excessive vibrations when it’s doing so, unlike some competitors. The biggest downside here is that the busy transmission simply ends up doing a lot of shifting up and down.

The Ranger’s engine stop/start system—which shuts off the engine at stop lights in an effort to improve fuel economy and reduce emissions—is quick to restart the engine when you want to get going again, but it causes some noticeable shudder when it does so. We appreciate that there is a button on the center console that allows you to easily turn the system off, if you find it annoying.

Spacious driving position So far, most people have had good things to say about the Ranger’s driving position. It’s pretty airy for a midsized truck, with lots of headroom and zero intrusion from the center console with the driver’s right knee—this keeps you from feeling hemmed in. There’s also a clear view of the driver’s instrument screen through the steering wheel. We found both the door and center armrests well placed with a good level of padding. The left footrest is also in a good spot, but it’s on the short side.

Comfortable front seats Thanks to a reasonably priced option package on the truck we purchased, both of the cloth front seats are power-operated, including two-way lumbar support adjustment. Most of our drivers like them so far, and they are definitely an improvement over the seats in the last Ranger we tested. They benefit from comfortable padding and just enough side bolstering to hold you in place through corners. It’s also helpful that the leading edge of the driver’s bottom cushion can be tilted up and down to help dial in leg support, if needed.

Relatively roomy rear seat Midsized pickups aren’t known for their rear-seat comfort—even the four-door crew-cab configuration that most trucks come in these days. But the Ranger’s rear seat is a bit more spacious than some of its competitors. Most of our passengers have found that there’s enough headroom, and we appreciate that there’s some foot space underneath the front seats. The seat’s bottom cushion is just long enough and high enough off the floor to give some under-leg support. Both the door and drop-down center armrests are pretty well placed. Ultimately, we still wouldn’t refer to the seat as “comfortable,” though, mostly due to the very upright seatback—a common trait in midsized pickups.

Quiet cabin One of the advantages the new Ranger appears to have over most of its competition is its reasonably hushed cabin. The turbocharged four-cylinder, in particular, is quieter than what we’ve experienced in the redesigned Toyota Tacoma, for example. That’s not to say the engine sounds “good”—it’s actually rather nondescript—but at least it isn’t gritty, gravelly, or overly trucky-sounding like some turbo-fours. There’s an uptick in wind noise on the highway, with sound swirling around the whole cabin, and some ambient air noise stemming from the rear-seat area, but road noise is very well controlled and overall we think Ford did a good job insulating outside sounds.

Mostly physical climate controls In these days of all-touchscreens all-the-time, it’s refreshing to get into a vehicle that still has physical controls for most common climate functions, as well as a volume knob for the audio system. The Ranger’s fan speed is adjusted with buttons, and the driver and passenger temperature are handled with knobs, although they are on the small side and have a rather cheap feel to them. Unfortunately, you have to go through the infotainment touchscreen to turn on or adjust the heated front seats, and the same goes for changing the airflow mode. Unlike in a lot of vehicles, the Ranger’s center dashboard air vents are nice and high, which makes it easy to get air onto your upper body and face. We’ve also noticed that the heated seats get nice and toasty.

Easy phone-calling We like that Ford allows you to access your recent phone calls by scrolling through a list within the driver’s screen by utilizing the steering-wheel controls; some vehicles force you to go through the infotainment touchscreen, instead.

What We Don't Like

Stiff and bouncy ride We didn’t like the outgoing Ranger’s stiff and choppy ride and, so far, we’re not liking what we’re feeling with the new Ranger, either. It’s true that you can only expect so much ride refinement out of a vehicle that uses a sturdy body-on-frame design, has rear leaf springs, and is capable of hauling heavy cargo or a trailer, as well as doing some off-road duty, but the reality is that there are other midsized pickups—most notably the Chevrolet Colorado—that provide more comfortable rides. While there is an initial layer of absorbency at play here, which keeps the Ranger somewhat civilized on smoother roads, it gets bouncy and unsettled when you encounter even slightly rough pavement. More pronounced bumps punch through in a pretty unrefined fashion, and you can feel the chassis shake and jiggle, along with some vibrations that come through the steering wheel, when you hit multiple smaller impacts in a row.

Clumsy handling Similar to the outgoing version, handling is a real weak point for the new Ranger. We certainly don’t expect it to go through corners anything remotely similar to a sports sedan (or even the SUV-like Honda Ridgeline), but a truck doesn’t have to feel this clumsy and ponderous. It turns in initially okay, and the stiff suspension does an excellent job curbing body roll, but the steering effort doesn’t ramp up as you make your way through the corner; instead, it feels overly light and lifeless. The steering is slow, too, which means you end up having to turn the wheel more than you’d think to get through most corners. Plus, while our test truck’s all-terrain tires look tough (and are surprisingly quiet), they deliver just about zero feedback to the driver about available grip or any information about the texture of the road.

Infotainment touchscreen The Ranger’s new cabin looks considerably more modern than the outgoing truck, in part due to the large, portrait-oriented (which means it’s taller than it is wide) touchscreen infotainment system. We’re not loving the new setup, though. First, Ford’s infotainment screen can be slow to respond to inputs. But more than that, the narrow layout of the screen forces the driver to look down low and far away from the road to see and use anything that’s situated toward the bottom portion of the display. Remember earlier when we said we really liked that the climate controls are almost all knobs and buttons? While their physical aspect makes them easier to use than touch-capacitive “buttons” on a panel, the vertical infotainment display forces the climate controls to be quite low and away from easy eyesight for the driver because they are situated below the screen.

What does this key-like thing do? We were surprised to find that our midlevel XLT trim (at nearly $43,000, as purchased) doesn’t come standard with keyless access and a push-button engine start system, but they aren’t even available as an option. To get them, you have to step up to the top-tier Lariat trim. Having to slide the key into the ignition slot and then turn it to start the engine seems so decidedly old-school. That said, that slot on the side of the steering column does provide a nice place to store the key fob while you’re driving.

Difficult to get in and out of It takes a good hop, step, and jump to get up and into the Ranger. Our truck has neither running boards nor a grab-handle on the driver’s side windshield pillar to help haul yourself up and in. (It does have one on the front passenger side.) A tall step up is required to enter the cabin, made more awkward for those who are shorter in stature. At least both the front and rear doors open pretty wide and the entryways are tall, so you don’t have to worry about conking your head on the way in. The lack of a grab handle for the rear passengers is even more surprising than for the driver; the driver can use the steering wheel to help haul themselves in, but those in the rear have to take hold of the back of the front seat while they jump up. It’s also a long reach back down to the ground when getting out, and those with shorter legs are likely to brush the back of their pants on the truck.

What We'll Keep an Eye On

Fuel mileage As with every vehicle that goes through our auto-test program, we’ll conduct our own fuel-economy tests with the 2024 Ranger. That means we’ll hook it up to our precise fuel-flow measuring device spliced into the fuel line to get the most accurate mpg numbers possible—for city, highway, and overall. Because our new Ranger has the same basic powertrain as the previous version we tested, we’re not expecting a big improvement, or possibly none at all. Then again, our new truck is about 50 pounds lighter than the old one, and if Ford made some aerodynamic gains with the body, then we might see a difference. We measured 20 mpg overall with the last Ranger 4WD we tested.

Ranger Raptor In an intriguing and exciting move, the new Ranger will be available in a hardcore off-road Raptor version, in the vein of the F-150 variant that’s been on sale for about 14 years; a Bronco Raptor hit the market for the 2022 model year. The Ranger Raptor is powered by a 405-hp, twin-turbo V6, and it uses a specially tuned version of the 10-speed automatic. It comes standard with four-wheel drive, 33-inch tires, a reinforced frame, and upgraded suspension, which includes an increase in overall travel. We’re hoping to rent a Ranger Raptor from Ford at some point in the future, as well as a Ranger equipped with the new 2.7-liter turbocharged V6.