2025 Ram 1500 Warlock First Test: The Most Honda-Like American Truck You Can Buy
Want Ram’s best off-road equipment, new Hurricane engine, the lowest price, and maximum satisfaction?
Pros
- Refined ride
- Powerful engine
- Immensely capable off-road
Cons
- Limited options for now
- Aging interior
- Smallish touchscreen
Every full-size truck maker offers at least one dedicated off-road variant, with names you might recognize such as Tremor (Ford), Trail Boss (Chevy), AT4 (GMC), TRD Pro (Toyota), and Pro-4X (Nissan). These are the do-it-all off-roaders, positioned midway or higher in their respective truck lineups; most start around the mid-$60,000 mark and go up from there. Ram’s 1500 Rebel is one such truck at such a price—only now you can get it at a steep discount, with an MSRP buried way down alongside competitors’ more basic four-wheel-drive trucks. And you won’t find a “Rebel” badge anywhere on it.
0:00 / 0:00
That’s because the truck we’re talking about is the new 2025 Ram 1500 Warlock. Its name might be vaguely familiar, if not as front-of-mind as those off-road trim levels listed above, because its history with off-road Dodge and Ram pickups dates to the 1970s. Its most recent turn came as a trim level on the now-discontinued, previous-generation Ram 1500 sold until this year alongside the newer DT-generation Ram 1500 as the “Classic.”
Warlock!
Whether you think the name is cool or goofy, the hardware it includes is serious stuff. You get the Rebel’s steel-spring suspension, which includes a 1.0-inch lift, Bilstein dampers, 33-inch Goodyear Wrangler all-terrain tires, a locking rear differential, a full array of underbody skidplates, and dual rear exhaust outlets. Ram throws in the same “Standard Output” Hurricane engine that powers the Rebel and is optional on lower-spec 1500s: a twin-turbo 3.0-liter inline-six making 420 hp and 469 lb-ft of torque.
This means that, functionally, the Warlock is just about as capable off-road as an entry-level Rebel. Its 10.1 inches of ground clearance and 23.1-degree approach, 20.0-degree breakover, and 22.8-degree departure angles allow it to scamper up and over virtually any terrain a Rebel might.
The Ram Rebel’s only advantages come from the features Ram chooses not to offer on the Warlock: a higher-clearance front bumper, an automatic four-wheel-drive setting (the Warlock’s transfer case is part-time only, with 2WD, 4 Hi, and 4 Lo modes), the option for an adjustable air suspension, and cosmetic touches such as the Rebel’s specific 18-inch wheel design and grille. The special front bumper and the air suspension can improve the Rebel’s off-road stats to 11.1 inches of ground clearance and 27.9-degree approach, 21.8-degree breakover, and 23.9-inch departure angles, but, again, aren't offered here.
Off-road at Holly Oaks ORV Park in Holly, Michigan, the Warlock slogs through mud, up sandy hills, and over rocks and potholes with aplomb. The suspension can even soak up truly rutted surfaces at moderate speeds—unlike many Rebel competitors, which can crawl or rock climb just fine but can’t be pushed the way, say, dedicated desert runners like the Ford F-150 Raptor or Ram 1500 RHO can be without violent head toss and the sensation you’re about to break something. The Ram 1500 Warlock’s off-road performance envelope is simply wider than other mainstream off-road full-size trucks’ the same way the Rebel’s is.
War Footing
So, too, is the 2025 Ram 1500 Warlock’s on-road performance envelope. As expected after our unexpectedly strong acceleration results from a 2025 Ram 1500 Tradesman work truck with the same standard-output Hurricane inline-six, the Warlock is quick, rides well, and drives beautifully. With its gnarly tires, extra 210 pounds of equipment, and our specific test truck’s taller rear axle ratio, the Warlock reaches 60 mph 0.4 second later in a still-fleet 5.2 seconds, and the 14.0-second quarter-mile time is similarly relaxed by 0.5 second. We figure if you order your Warlock with the same 3.92 rear end as the Tradesman we tested previously, rather than the 3.55 unit on this Warlock test vehicle, your truck will be a 5.0-seconds-or-less performer to 60 mph.
Other performance metrics slip somewhat, again mostly due to the Warlock’s off-road tires. The lateral grip drops from 0.72 g to 0.69 g, and the stopping distance from 60 mph stretches from a decent 127 feet to a long 139 feet.
But the real story is how the Ram Warlock’s off-road equipment doesn’t dent the 1500’s class-leading refinement. The cabin is crypt quiet—you can only faintly hear the all-terrain rubber moan when cornering hard—and no gristle from the road or those tires makes its way to your butt through the seat, feet through the pedals, or hands through the wheel. The ride is firm and well controlled, and the 1500’s sheer size and those tall-sidewall tires ensure speed bumps, pockmarked pavement, and similar obstacles are dispatched like faraway problems for another day.
As in the Ram Tradesman, the inline-six is silky and muted, and the transmission shuffles to the highest available ratio without penalty, thanks to the engine’s torque. Prodding the accelerator pedal deeper wakes this engine up nicely and generates odd (for an American pickup) BMW-like noises from the dual tailpipes. We know Mopar people still lament Ram’s take-it-out-back-and-shoot-it ending for the Hemi V-8, but this Hurricane engine is truly better.
Rebellious Discount!
For all this refinement, engine, and capability, you’ll pay just $56,255—about 10 grand less than the least expensive 1500 Rebel. How? The Ram Warlock essentially is a Tradesman work truck with the Rebel’s mechanicals. Everything else about it is basic, basic, basic. It, like the Tradesman, gets the pre-2025-refresh dashboard (every other 1500 wears a newer design); the seats are wrapped in cloth, and there are six of them thanks to the 40/20/40 split front bench; the door panels are 100 percent hard plastic with unpadded elbow rests; and the 8.4-inch touchscreen is small for such a huge truck.
Set your preferred air temperature manually via knobs, manually slide your seat fore and aft and determine the backrest’s recline angle (there are no other adjustments), and—you guessed it—manually adjust the steering column to comfortably grasp the steering wheel’s plastic rim.
This will sound strange, but appreciating the Warlock almost requires a Honda buyer’s mindset. Loyal Honda customers appreciate that brand’s mechanical excellence enough to look past its vehicles’ often so-so feature content (often, you need to buy the most expensive version of a given Honda for all the toys—the company keeps most trim levels mono-spec, with few or no options). The Warlock is the most Honda-like product in the full-size truck world (Honda's own pickup, the Ridgeline, competes as a midsize): You buy it for the excellent engine, the stout frame, well-screwed-together interior, and the capable suspension, not the whiz-bang feature of the day or flashiness.
And basic doesn’t mean punishing—what’s included is pretty much everything you might need: wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, an immense and comfortably reclined back seat and wide-opening rear doors, and remote engine starting. There are unexpected touches, as well, like the upscale metal knurling to the dashboard knobs and tipping the rocker switches for traction control, bed lighting, tow/haul mode, and the front and rear parking sensors. (Opt for the trailering package, and those switches are replaced by pushbuttons and a knob for the trailer’s backup assist feature.) Ram’s saddle-bag-style in-floor cargo bins, which straddle the frame rails and feature removable and washable plastic liners, are included—perfect, one of our Ram-owning staffers notes, for storing the spoils of a hunt on ice.
The $695 Bed Utility package adds a spray-in bedliner and in-bed power outlets, along with organizers underneath the fold-up rear seats. There are bins and stash spaces everywhere, from a drawer beneath the rocker switches on the center stack to the bin atop the dash to the deep shelf in front of the passenger seat. If you carry a lot of crap with you, the Ram Warlock has spots for it.
Pull it all together, and the 2025 Ram 1500 Warlock is just a damn good truck, no matter what you plan to use it for. Buy it because you need a full-size rig to go off-road for as little money as possible. Buy it for the subtly badass look, or the lack of compromises in on-road refinement, or because you want a quick truck. Buy it for all or none of the above—you’re buying excellence all the same.
A lifelong car enthusiast, I stumbled into this line of work essentially by accident after discovering a job posting for an intern position at Car and Driver while at college. My start may have been a compelling alternative to working in a University of Michigan dining hall, but a decade and a half later, here I am reviewing cars; judging our Car, Truck, and Performance Vehicle of the Year contests; and shaping MotorTrend’s daily coverage of the automotive industry.
Read More
