The 2025 Rivian R1S Large pack is...uh...not so Large (or efficient)

[Goose]

One good thing about the gen 2, is that you can regularly charge it to 100%, right? Because it is LFP battery chemistry.

Only the Standard battery is LFP, the Large and Max are NMC chemistry.

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[TomServo2112]

My anecdotal experiences on my Gen 2 Dual Performance Large+ with 21k miles.
Lifetime is pushing 2.6 miles/kwh, and I expect (hope) that to go up a few ticks over the summer since I took delivery in September as temperatures started ticking downwards.
I have many stretches under 50mph when I’m not road tripping where I get over 3.0 for several hundred miles over the course of a week or two. Those are the only portions of my usage where I feel I can get the EPA rated range.
I had a round trip from SoCal to Denver that amazingly gave me over 2.5mi/kWh.
I’ve made it from my house in SoCal to the Vegas RAN (305 miles) from 100 to 2% or 3%, both in warm weather and in a bit cooler winter temps (for the area), but have also not come close because of winds, as well.
2.3mi/kwh is a number I see on an underwhelming road trip with a lot of elevation gain from SoCal up the I-15 into Utah at ~9k feet. But sometimes that same trip barely gives me 2.1, but occasionally 2.4. All at highway speeds. My only sub 2.0 trip was coming *back* from elevation when there were such crazy winds that getting out of the R1 to charge was physically a challenge.

So I’d say that 2.3 mi/kWh is definitely an issue under the circumstances OP described and is not necessarily typical for a Dual Large. If those were the numbers I regularly get at ~50mph I’d be disappointed too.

 

[Riviot]

pre-conditioned for 30+ minutes on a Level 2

I thought we, on the forum, determined this does nothing to the battery and just affects the cabin? Can someone remind/link me to findings?

OP, what temp were batteries on your R1S and Cybertruck? That's a huge factor. Rivians like to be over 75°F before they yield good efficiency.

 

[carsly]

I thought we, on the forum, determined this does nothing to the battery and just affects the cabin? Can someone remind/link me to findings?

OP, what temp were batteries on your R1S and Cybertruck? That's a huge factor. Rivians like to be over 75°F before they yield good efficiency.

Ambient temps were 50-52 degrees at the start of journey for both. Imagine battery temps were similar to ambient as vehicles had been sitting outside. Worst case is they were 2-4 degrees cooler, but nowhere near freezing or sub-freezing conditions.

Only the RIvian was pre-conditioned. Whether pre-conditioning warmed the Rivian's battery - which it should, somewhat nonsensical to NOT pre-heat or cool the battery as needed when connected to shore power and a request has been made via app to precondition.

 

[carsly]

My anecdotal experiences on my Gen 2 Dual Performance Large+ with 21k miles.
Lifetime is pushing 2.6 miles/kwh, and I expect (hope) that to go up a few ticks over the summer since I took delivery in September as temperatures started ticking downwards.
I have many stretches under 50mph when I’m not road tripping where I get over 3.0 for several hundred miles over the course of a week or two. Those are the only portions of my usage where I feel I can get the EPA rated range.
I had a round trip from SoCal to Denver that amazingly gave me over 2.5mi/kWh.
I’ve made it from my house in SoCal to the Vegas RAN (305 miles) from 100 to 2% or 3%, both in warm weather and in a bit cooler winter temps (for the area), but have also not come close because of winds, as well.
2.3mi/kwh is a number I see on an underwhelming road trip with a lot of elevation gain from SoCal up the I-15 into Utah at ~9k feet. But sometimes that same trip barely gives me 2.1, but occasionally 2.4. All at highway speeds. My only sub 2.0 trip was coming *back* from elevation when there were such crazy winds that getting out of the R1 to charge was physically a challenge.

So I’d say that 2.3 mi/kWh is definitely an issue under the circumstances OP described and is not necessarily typical for a Dual Large. If those were the numbers I regularly get at ~50mph I’d be disappointed too.

Good to know, thanks for sharing.

At mild/moderate temps and with 30+ minutes of preconditioning, negligible elevation changes and speed of travel between 35-55mph with minimal stop and go on a clear/partly cloudy day I was expecting somewhere closer to 3 mi/kwh as I get on my Cybertruck.

 

[carsly]

I think OPs issue is the 330 mile range, vs the 260 mile range his test yielded. He would have to get an efficiency of at least 3 mi/kwh to get that range. Is it possible? Sure, just drive 35 mph for 9 hours. One good thing about the gen 2, is that you can regularly charge it to 100%, right? Because it is LFP battery chemistry.

The other thing is about the "30 minutes of pre-conditioning". I haven't noticed that being plugged into L2 does ANYTHING when it is not actively charging. I stay connected to L2 90% of the time in the driveway, and I still take a huge eff hit when I start out.

I am still amazed that people spend this kind of money on a vehicle and are surprised by the real-world results that are well documented in forums like this. None of this should be a surprise to someone who researches before the sale.

Thanks, placed my deposit in 2021 and have kept up with the changes. The Gen 2 Dual is marketed as more efficiency than Gen 1 as evidenced by it's EPA range of 330 miles in my config with the "Large" pack. I did know the new large pack is down 22 kwh in capacity. What did not realize is that Rivian's new "efficient" Gen 2 architecture just...isn't. It's no more efficient than Gen 1. Which means in the real world the Gen 1 Quad running Conserve is likely going further on a full charge than a Gen 2 Dual in All Purpose with both having "Large" packs. The loss of battery capacity was NOT compensated for with improved efficiency as far as I can tell. So much for removing xx miles of copper wiring, simplifying numbers of ECU's, etc. it's just marketing fluff.

BTW, my Cybertruck AWD regularly outperforms its EPA efficiency in these conditions as I shared via screenshot. Not sure why a pre-conditioned 2025 Rivian would so horribly underperform when the Gen 1 was known for at least meeting EPA numbers in comparable conditions.

 

[Riviot]

Ambient temps were 50-52 degrees at the start of journey for both. Imagine battery temps were similar to ambient as vehicles had been sitting outside. Worst case is they were 2-4 degrees cooler, but nowhere near freezing or sub-freezing conditions.

That all depends; did you charge right before leaving? Was that level 2 or DCFC? Direct sun or not? Windy? Rainy? Lots of conditions can affect battery temp. For instance, my garage is 60°F and ambient temp was 42°F this morning but my battery was 81°F because I level 2 charged from 30%-75% right up to the point of leaving.

So, battery temp really matters. If your battery was 50°F, I could see a 10-20% efficiency hit as it tries to warm the batteries.

 

[HaveBlue]

My max pack Gen 1 also gets 2.4 lifetime. That's about within 10% of EPA. I knew these things would never get EPA unless you really hyper mile. 350 miles of real world is what I settled on and rarely have to DC on trips.

 

[Dark-Fx]

such wow, many range. Enjoy your cybertruck I guess? You've been in my "just here to be disappointed" bucket for a long time.

 

[andrewgrhogg]

I think people forget how good Teslas actually are - re battery tech, aero, etc that lead to excellent range on small batteries. They've been at it longer than most, Rivian is new, and i would NEVER expect my Rivian to get anywhere close to the efficiency of any Tesla. Rivians battery conditioning tech is just fucking awful comparatively, one warming/cooling plate through the middle of the pack! WTF!! Tesla has coolant running around each cell....and has for years. But yeah - im never buying another Tesla...

 

[Rividiculous]

Took a 70 mile trip today, charged up to 85% then pre-conditioned for 30+ minutes on a Level 2 before heading off. Flat terrain, 22" Sport Brights, 50-51psi all around, <1,000 miles on the vehicle, All Purpose in either Low or Standard ride height (shifted to Low halfway through), 50-55 degrees ambient temps and about 1:45 travel time. Typical speeds were 35-55mph but tended towards the lower end which should have been near ideal conditions for a high-efficiency run. Real world? Not so much. Very disappointed in the Dual "Large"



How are others faring? I can't even imagine what range would be at highway speeds.

I haven’t watched the video but at those speeds I am surprised if you are not getting the rated range. If I am in all purpose and driving conservatively at 40-65 mph, I generally hit the EPA range figures. If I’m in sport mode and/or driving with more umph and higher speeds, I’m maybe taking a 25% hit. (Dual Gen2 max pack.) Worse when it’s really cold, of course.

 

[carsly]

I haven’t watched the video but at those speeds I am surprised if you are not getting the rated range. If I am in all purpose and driving conservatively at 40-65 mph, I generally hit the EPA range figures. If I’m in sport mode and/or driving with more umph and higher speeds, I’m maybe taking a 25% hit. (Dual Gen2 max pack.) Worse when it’s really cold, of course.

BINGO. That's why I wanted to share the observation and see what other people's experiences are. I've only had the R1S Dual Large for two months so am just figuring it out. Given the conditions, something within spitting distance of EPA is what I would expect to see on other EV's I've owned with a few even exceeding EPA. Never thought I'd be coming up 20-25% short. With this being my fifth EV, I'm very careful with throttle management so I know it's not driving style.

I also have a crap-ton of wind noise above 40mph around the window seals. It's worse than a frameless window, almost sounds like all the windows are open a crack, which they are not. At some point I'll collect a batch of items and schedule a service appointment.

 

[carsly]

That all depends; did you charge right before leaving? Was that level 2 or DCFC? Direct sun or not? Windy? Rainy? Lots of conditions can affect battery temp. For instance, my garage is 60°F and ambient temp was 42°F this morning but my battery was 81°F because I level 2 charged from 30%-75% right up to the point of leaving.

So, battery temp really matters. If your battery was 50°F, I could see a 10-20% efficiency hit as it tries to warm the batteries.

Level 2 charged at 32 amps overnight to 80%. Charged from 80-85% an hour before departure to warm up the pack. Overnight temps were high 40's, no rain. Temps in the morning were in the low 50's for a few hours before departure. Set climate control on for 30+ minutes before departure to minimize impact of cabin heating during the trip. Climate temps set at 71-73 during trip (had set to 75 during pre-conditioning). Was sunny/partly cloudy the entire trip. *shrug*

 

[Kaiju]

BINGO. That's why I wanted to share the observation and see what other people's experiences are. I've only had the R1S Dual Large for two months so am just figuring it out. Given the conditions, something within spitting distance of EPA is what I would expect to see on other EV's I've owned with a few even exceeding EPA. Never thought I'd be coming up 20-25% short. With this being my fifth EV, I'm very careful with throttle management so I know it's not driving style.

One thing I will mention is during my first month of ownership my efficiency was trash and it took a while to get anywhere close to EPA ratings despite being in warm weather. I believe the Pirellis actually have a break-in period with high rolling resistance until they wear a bit. Second was that on delivery my truck had an issue where the rear motor was always engaged no matter the mode. A month later it got fixed and were I was getting 1.8 and 1.9 where I now get 2.5.

 

[DayTripping]

BINGO. That's why I wanted to share the observation and see what other people's experiences are. I've only had the R1S Dual Large for two months so am just figuring it out. Given the conditions, something within spitting distance of EPA is what I would expect to see on other EV's I've owned with a few even exceeding EPA. Never thought I'd be coming up 20-25% short. With this being my fifth EV, I'm very careful with throttle management so I know it's not driving style.

I also have a crap-ton of wind noise above 40mph around the window seals. It's worse than a frameless window, almost sounds like all the windows are open a crack, which they are not. At some point I'll collect a batch of items and schedule a service appointment.

The wind noise is a pretty common issue. Lots of wind noise mitigation threads including my own here https://www.rivianforums.com/forum/...e-thread-what-has-worked-so-far-for-me.43009/.

I would start with doing a window calibration first on all your windows. My wind noise was moderate up to about 75 mph of airspeed and then the buffeting was so bad it has made me start to hate my truck and consider selling it.

Tires can definitely take time to break in.

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