Hello and welcome to Laguna Beach in California,
specifically to a very old theatre
that was opened in 1935 but has recently been rescued and renovated by Rivian,
who's turned it into one of their signature spaces.
But we're not here to talk about architecture, are we?
We're here to talk about a brand-new car that is behind me – the Rivian R2.
It's a little bit chaotic.
We've come in the day before the big reveal event,
which is all going on tomorrow.
That's why I've got my booties on, because I don't want to mess up
this nice floor here.
It's why I've got my phone in my hand,
because we've just been handed the details on this new thing.
And I don't want to miss a single thing because there is so much to talk about.
This car, the Rivian R2.
What is it?
Well, it is Rivian's more affordable, slightly smaller model.
We all know they all know the R1T and the R1S,
and we all know the formula.
You start with the bigger, more expensive models, and then you filter
down to deliver the same or a similar experience to the masses.
And that's what the R2 is all about.
Is this Rivian's Tesla Model Y moment?
Well, it shareholders certainly hope it is. And Model Y is poignant
because I've run the numbers and this is about an inch shorter,
about an inch narrower and a few inches taller than the Tesla Model Y.
So it's right in that SUV sweet spot that everyone is buying in
absolutely enormous numbers.
The other big news for all our UK and European viewers is it
is going to come to Europe. It will be sold in the US first,
of course, because that's where it's built.
But it is going to be coming to Europe eventually.
Deliveries of this in the US start in the first half of 2026.
It's going to cost from $45,000.
What else can I tell you about it?
It's based on an all-new platform, this all new mid-sized platform,
and you can choose from three versions.
So there's not a ton of technical details on the car now.
Of course, we're two years out from first deliveries,
so you wouldn't expect that.
But we're going to go through all the details.
Three versions: single motor, dual-motor and tri-motor –
that's got two motors on the back axle, one on the front axle,
0 to 60 in under 3 seconds.
And you're going to have a range of over 300 miles.
Again, not a load of detail on the battery other than it's
now a structural part of this new platform.
Essentially the top of the battery is the floorpan that your feet will sit in.
And inside the car it's got new battery chemistry, it's more energy dense.
Let's talk a little bit
about the design of this car
because it very much picks up where the R1S left off.
You've got that signature,
very distinctive Rivian signature, lights at the front.
You've got a frunk under there. We'll get a separate shot of that,
so you can see that.
It's got something called perception stack.
I like that name.
It's 11 cameras, it's five radars.
It's more computing power.
It's basically a significant upgrade in the autonomous driving
capabilities of the Rivian.
There's lots more I can tell you as well... 20-in wheels.
Let's come down the side here.
Now, as you know, Rivian is all about adventure.
So this car is designed to go off-road, of course.
And they've got some very, very cool accessories that come along with this.
The reason I'm mentioning
that first is because on the screen here we have something called
well, a sketch, at least of something called the Rivian Treehouse.
Now, I love this.
It's riffing off those treetop forts
that we all dreamed about having when we were kids.
It's basically a rooftop tent, but it's got integrated lighting.
It's got a heated mattress for anyone that's ever been camping.
You can see how that is very appealing indeed.
And supposedly it's got a, a projection, a TV screen as well.
So you can watch movies.
I'm very much on board with that.
In terms of the interior, well, it's very simple.
That's what I like about Rivian.
The quality in here is way above anything I've seen inside a Tesla,
and there's a few cool tricks that it's got going on.
These wheels in front of me here,
I've never seen anything like this.
So they've got haptic feedback built into them.
You can roll them up and down either side, you can click them left,
you can click them right, you can push them in,
you can push them back from the behind of the wheel.
And it just opens up a world of options.
It's a really interesting way of sort of combining physical controls,
physical feedback on the wheels with that digital haptic layer of feedback.
And the rest is, yeah, the screen, the instrument cluster behind there,
very much R1S tech on the central screen.
But of course, as I said, this is all about adventure.
You might need to stick your camera in here because the back seats on this car,
you've actually got more
rear legroom here than you do in an R1S,
despite this being a smaller footprint on the road.
And check this out,
you can fold the front seat flat so you can add extra stuff in.
You can put the rear seats flat so you can do car camping,
which actually sounds even more appealing than sleeping in a tent on the roof, doesn't it?
But it's all clever stuff.
It's designed so you can take this car on a proper adventure.
Other tricks? Yes. So it's got something,
I can't remember the name of the mode, but it will drop all the windows here,
these four windows. These rear-quarter windows will pop out electrically.
And the rear screen as well winds down into the rear hatch
and give you this sort of unique open-air experience.
Something similar that we've seen on the Fisker Ocean,
but obviously interpreted a little differently here.
But that's not all,
because not only has Rivian brought us the R2, that's coming soonest,
on the same platform, this new midsize platform,
there is another car, a genuine surprise!
So rare these days that we get a new car and then there's one that blindsides us.
But this is it.
It's the R3.
Again. It's smaller than the R2.
It's going to be more affordable.
It's going to come after the R2.
So let's just put that into the speculation computer.
Yeah, this will start from $35,000 to $40,000.
Probably be 2027 before these are delivered,
but very similar technology underneath – 300 miles of range from the battery,
slightly shorter wheelbase.
Again, signature front-end design.
But then when you come round the back, look how cool this is.
This feels like a sort of a very traditional kind of jacked-up hatchback look to the rear of this car.
I'm a big fan.
It's a quite a big departure,
actually, from when you look at the back of the R2 over there
and you compare that to the R1S.
And this has a trick tailgate.
Now, Brian, you're going to have to push the buttons here
or I'm going to make a big fool of myself.
- Which do you want to see first? - Let's-let's lift this rear.
So that one opens up separately.
Put your stuff in.
But if you've got a surfboard or something long or anything else,
then you can just pull it down
and it will stop at various heights to sort of wedge that in there.
Or you can press another button and the entire hatch lifts up.
Ta da!
Thank you, Brian.
That was, that was beautifully done.
But that's not all because behind you we have something else.
So this is called the R3X and it is the performance version of the R3.
They're still piecing it together for the big reveal tomorrow.
But essentially the performance version, very light on technical details.
But I'm going to fill in the gaps, don't worry.
Tri-motor well under three seconds, 0 to 60, range of over 300 miles.
This is the most car-like, the most aggressive,
the most hot hatch-like version.
If you, if you think today, well before today,
when Rivian were making the big, rugged R1T truck and the massive R1S.
I mean, they don't look so massive here when you're in America, but
on UK roads, those things are enormous.
All the way down to this.
I mean, it's like the modern electric interpretation of a hot hatch, isn't it?
I think it looks fantastic.
So much going on.
I'm actually hoping to corner
the CEO, RJ Scaringe, tomorrow.
I've got a ton of questions to ask him because literally I'm just going
off a spec sheet at the moment and telling you what I see.
I literally walked into this hall, seeing these cars, being blown away,
being overwhelmed by the direction that Rivian's going in.
And then I've just been spouting to this camera
and have no idea what I've just said.
But look, 50,000 cars I think Rivian produced last year – R1Ts and R1Ss.
Turns out that was just the appetiser.
This stuff is the main course.