For years, Ram was the undisputed momentum story in the full-size pickup truck wars. From 2015 to 2019, the brand staged one of the most impressive climbs in modern automotive history. While Chevrolet Silverado and Ford F-Series swapped the sales crown back and forth and Toyota Tundra languished in a distant fourth, Ram went from a perennial also-ran to a legitimate threat.
It's a good looking truck, inside and out. so...Let's look back a little....
In 2018, Ram stunned the industry by launching the all-new fifth-generation Ram 1500. Critics raved. The truck swept nearly every major award: MotorTrend Truck of the Year, North American Truck of the Year, even luxury-truck comparisons against high-end Denali and King Ranch models. Interior quality jumped light-years ahead of its predecessors; the optional 12-inch portrait Uconnect screen looked like it belonged in a Bentley, not a work truck. Ride quality, towing tech (active air suspension, blind-spot monitoring that accounted for trailer length), and the available eTorque mild-hybrid system gave Ram legitimate bragging rights.
The sales chart told the story. In 2019, Ram sold 633,694 trucks in the United States—its best year ever and the first time it cracked 600,000 annually. It closed the gap with Silverado to roughly 100,000 units and put real pressure on second place. Dealers couldn’t keep Limited and Laramie Longhorn models on the lots. For a fleeting moment, some analysts openly wondered whether Ram could actually catch the Big Two.
Fast-forward to 2025. The picture is dramatically different. Through the first ten months of the year, Ram sales have cratered. Year-over-year declines are routinely in the double digits—20% drops in some months. The brand is on pace for its worst performance since the dark days of 2012-2013. Showrooms that once had waiting lists now have rows of unsold 1500s gathering dust. The same trucks that dominated comparison tests a few years ago are suddenly moving only with heavy incentives and 0% financing for 84 months.
The trajectory is baffling on the surface. The current Ram 1500 is still the 2019 redesign with incremental updates—new Hurricane inline-six engines, refreshed styling in 2025, more tech. Nothing catastrophic happened to the product itself. Yet the momentum has vanished almost overnight.
So what changed?
That’s the question no one inside or outside Auburn Hills seems able to answer with certainty. Was it pricing that finally crossed the pain threshold? Quality issues that flew under the radar during the honeymoon phase? The loss of fleet business? Supply-chain constraints that starved dealers at exactly the wrong time? Labor strikes? Brand fatigue? The shift toward electrification that left Ram without a competitive hybrid or EV offering while Ford and GM sprinted ahead?
Or is something bigger happening in the market that Ram simply got caught on the wrong side of?
The comment section is open. Tell us: Why do you think Ram truck sales have fallen off a cliff after years of climbing the charts against Chevy, Ford, and Toyota? What flipped the switch?
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