Even when it’s pictured solo, with no people or other vehicles around, the Tesla Cybertruck is a wild-looking machine. Those aggressive angles and brutalist flat surfaces see to that. But catch sight of it alongside a regular Tesla sedan and with a conventionally-styled three-box pickup close behind, and the Cybertruck really does start to look like it’s beamed down from another planet.
The most startling first impression garnered from these images posted to the Cybertruck Owners Club forum is how small the Tesla pickup appears next to the Rivian R1T that’s nosing up behind it. But the Rivian is nearer the camera, so is bound to look bigger – a point quickly picked up by Cybertruck fans – and comparing what little has been confirmed about the Tesla’s measurements with those of the Rivian leads us to believe it’s very much an optical illusion.
Tesla revealed last month that the Cybertruck would be “less than 19-ft long” (228-inches / 5.79 m), but that might still make it longer than the Rivian, which measures 217.1-inches (5.51 m), and the Tesla’s “more than 6-ft” (1.8 m) bed will be longer, too. As for the other dimensions, we can can’t be sure, but there’s no getting around how wide the Tesla looks, or how much lower the Tesla’s roofline appears. Or how striking the pyramid-shaped roofline looks out in the real world.
Related: New Video Reveals Just How Small Tesla Cybertruck’s Frunk Will Be
The image suggests that the Cybertruck driver sits much lower than an R1T driver, and that the Tesla has less ground clearance and a much shorter rear overhang. We already suspect from leaked shots showing the Cybertruck with its frunk raised that it will have less front luggage space than rivals like Ford’s F-150 Lightning, though to be fair, the R1T’s frunk isn’t huge.
And what about that camo wrap? It might only be there because the truck in question is a prototype, but we think it looks great and could imagine a few Cybertruck owners replicating the look when the truck hits the road and they realize that every other example looks the same as theirs.
What also stands out to us is how far Tesla has moved away from its established curvy design language, as seen on the Model S in the next lane. The S is more than a decade old so we can understand that Tesla might want to update its look, but the Cybertruck’s style is so uncompromising that we can’t see it being expanded to future versions of the firm’s cars and SUVs.
Source: Cybertruck Owners Club