It’s easy to write off the Ford Maverick as ‘not a real truck.’ Next to the hulking half-ton pickups Americans are used to seeing populate our roads, Ford’s new baby hauler can barely find its way out from their shadows. But that’s the point. It’s small. Not everyone needs a massive, six-foot-tall apartment on wheels. The Maverick exists for those people.
I spent a weekend with a bare-bones, front-wheel-drive hybrid stripper Maverick riding on steelies, lacking satellite radio and power mirrors—a phenomenal spec. A breed we rarely encounter while evaluating vehicles. The out-the-door cost for this example was $21,490, after destination and delivery fees. It’s as cheap as they come.
For the purpose of this test, I used the Maverick as a mini-mover, transporting the contents of a one-bedroom Brooklyn apartment to a nearby storage unit. While this was a task best suited for a commercial van, the mini-truck took it on like a champ. It’s also something I wouldn’t have been able to accomplish with most small to medium-sized crossovers.
Thanks to its low tailgate-down height of 30 inches, loading heavy items like my two-person couch and queen-sized mattress were as easy as can be. The surprisingly spacious backseat was also useful for transporting smaller things. Its 54.4-inch-long bed was barely long enough to fit the couch with the tailgate down, which meant multiple trips were needed in order to complete the whole job.
With its compact size, cargo space isn’t exactly where the Maverick shines. But, it did make for some extremely easy intercity driving. Squeezing past double-parked cars was a cinch, parallel parking was effortless, and the truck never felt like it was hogging too much of any New York City street it was on. It felt like a car that happened to have a pickup truck bed on the back.
Design-wise, its looks are a bit cartoonish. I can’t help feeling like the Maverick’s front-end is sporting a stupid shit-eating grin. It’s not ugly. It just has a very punchable face. Inside, there are rounded-off edges everywhere. The materials are plasticky, though nothing felt cheap, even in base spec. There were no cringe-worthy rental car quality vibes.
Around the city, the 191-horsepower 2.5-liter base hybrid powerplant was plucky, though it didn’t scream speed. Not that it needed to, this is a small pickup. It just got the job done, even when loaded up. Annoyingly, the brake pedal and the truck’s regenerative braking system could be touchy and unpredictable for low-speed city maneuvering, especially during parallel parking. This would be less of an issue after spending more time getting used to the Maverick.
The Maverick gives off Baby’s First Truck vibes. I like that. It serves as a welcoming gateway for city folk to dabble with truck life. There’s something worlds more satisfying about running errands in a pickup truck than a boring crossover. It comes with a sense of accomplishment and pride, a feeling of getting shit done and having places to be. Also, the Maverick Hybrid has a cute backup beeper. It feels like piloting a European streetcar. I love it.
A native of the famously car-loving city of New York, Road & Track’s digital director is constantly surrounded by beat-up old project cars. His fleet currently consists of a problematic manual-swapped 1991 BMW 325i sedan, an E34 M5 of the same vintage, an M2, and a Lexus GX470. Before R&T, Brown worked at Jalopnik, The Drive, and Business Insider.
