A good place to start when selecting a pickup truck is with a realistic assessment of your actual needs. If you're not planning to carry multi-ton loads or pull a very heavy trailer, then you probably don't need a full-sized heavy-duty pickup truck. A lighter-duty full-sized truck or even a compact pickup should fit the bill. If you don't need to haul dirty cargo like construction debris, mulch, or manure, another vehicle type, such as a minivan or SUV, could be a better choice. If you only need a pickup every once in a while, for some specific task, you might be better off renting one for those occasions rather than buying one and making it do double duty as a family car.
Check our Car Brand Report Cards to learn more about each automaker.
If the truck will serve as both a workhorse and family transport, though, then consider an extended-cab or crew-cab model with four doors. That's probably the most common configuration these days. If you plan to drive in snow, deep mud, or more than a short distance off road, then you should choose four-wheel drive.
Pickup trucks come in endless permutations: full-sized or compact; long bed or short; regular, extended, or crew cab; two door or four; two- or four-wheel drive; standard or automatic transmission; and so on. Engines range from small four-cylinders and V6s to V8s and big diesels. Base prices range from less than $20,000 to almost $60,000.
Pickup nomenclature. By far the biggest-selling full-sized pickups, sometimes called half-ton trucks, carry the designation "1500" in the case of the Chevrolet Silverado, GMC Sierra, and Ram, and "150" in Ford's parlance. Heavier-duty trucks are designated 2500, 3500 (or F-250, F-350) and so forth. The terms "half-ton" for the 1500s and "three-quarter-ton" for the 2500s are widely used but obsolete: a holdover from decades ago when the number referred to the maximum cargo weight capacity. Conversationally, the 2500-series and heavier trucks are known as "heavy duty," but that's not technically correct, either. The U.S. Government considers any truck that weighs less than 14,000 pounds, including 3500-series, to be a light-duty truck. But we'll continue to refer to 2500-series trucks as "heavy-duty," as these are serious workhorses.
Considering their vast sales volumes, there aren't all that many pickup truck brands from which to choose from. Ford and Chevrolet/GMC are the largest sellers, followed by Ram (formerly known as Dodge). The Japanese brands have a smaller role, led by Toyota and trailing with far fewer sales, Nissan and Honda. Industry rumor suggests that Hyundai is almost ready to produce a small truck, as well.
