At long last, Ford has revealed its redesigned midsize pickup truck in full, and that means we have a complete picture of its angriest off-road model: the 2024 Ford Ranger Raptor. What you’re all wondering is how it compares to GM’s equivalent, the 2023 Chevrolet Colorado ZR2 (and by extension, the 2023 GMC Canyon AT4X). Well, we’ve crunched the numbers, and we think we know where each truck will excel—or could fall short.
For starters, let’s look at what traits the most aggressive off-road Ranger and Colorado share. They’re both midsize crew-cab pickups of nearly the same dimensions, with similar weights, and beds of about the same size. Each has a turbo engine making 430 pound-feet of torque, top-shelf off-road dampers, skid plates to armor their engines, and two-speed, four-wheel-drive transfer cases.
Both also feature locking diffs front and rear, leaf-sprung solid axles out back, and identical ground clearance at 10.7 inches. That’s in part because they use the same tire size, 33-inch 285-sections, mounted to 17-inch, bead lock-capable wheels. Each have a class win at a major off-road race to their name—Chevy at the Mint 400, Ford at the Baja 1000.
From these alone, you could be forgiven for thinking these trucks are interchangeable. But dig deeper into their specs and you’ll find their purposes mirror those of their larger counterparts, the Silverado ZR2 and F-150 Raptor, which are optimized for very different kinds of off-road driving.
2024 Ford Ranger Raptor
Powertrain: 3.0-liter twin-turbo V6 8-speed automatic transmission