Ford opens preorder invites for the $30,000 Fathom EV pickup — SkimNews
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- Ford opened preorder invites for the Fathom EV pickup, with official preorders set to begin in early 2027 and the first prototypes scheduled for production later that year at its 3-million-square-foot Louisville Assembly Plant.
- The Fathom starts at $28,350 for the standard-range battery model ($29,945 with the $1,595 destination fee) — roughly half the price of the F-150 Lightning.
- Ford says the Fathom is the first model on its new Universal Electric Vehicle (UEV) platform and will use cobalt- and nickel-free lithium iron phosphate (LFP) batteries that serve as the vehicle's floor, lowering the center of gravity.
- Standard equipment will include Apple Maps integration in the navigation system, a large touchscreen, BlueCruise hands-free highway driving, bidirectional charging, and an NACS port for Tesla Supercharger compatibility.
- Ford claims the Fathom will offer more passenger room than a Toyota RAV4 (excluding frunk and bed), cost less to own over five years than a three-year-old used Tesla Model Y, and hit 0-60 mph as fast as a Mustang EcoBoost.
- Jim Farley told the 2026 Automotive News Congress that "It's going to be a heck of an effort to launch this at scale, at cost, on time," though a Ford spokesperson confirmed to Electrek that the 2027 launch timeline has not changed.
Why it matters: The sub-$30,000 Fathom will undercut Ford's own F-150 Lightning by roughly half and arrives as Ford's first product on a dedicated EV platform after its first-generation EV program. With CEO Jim Farley publicly warning that launching it "at scale, at cost, on time" will be a "heck of an effort," the truck becomes a high-stakes test of whether Ford can deliver a budget EV on schedule and at the margins needed to compete on price.
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