2025 Ram 1500 RHO Up Close: It’s Not the TRX Replacement, and I Ain’t Mad About It

Anyone who’s driven a Ford F-150 Raptor pretty much loves it; it’s super comfy, looks fantastic and feels like it can jump parking lot speed bumps with ease. Anyone who’s driven a Ram 1500 TRX also loves it because it has all of those elements and then packs a screaming 707-horsepower Hellcat V-8 under the hood. What’s not so nice about the TRX? The nearly $100,000 price tag, which turns the T-Rex from “I’ve got to get me one of these!” to “I’ll never in my life be able to afford one of these.”

Well, for all of you off-road Baja truck fans who wanted the more affordable Raptor formula in a Ram-brand truck (like me), your prayers have been answered: The 2025 Ram 1500 RHO is exactly that. It has the goodness of the TRX’s top-notch high-speed off-road suspension, with bulbous styling that warns other trucks not to get too close but a more reasonable engine — and a far more reasonable base price.

Related: 2025 Ram 1500 RHO: Finally, the Ram Raptor You’ve Been Waiting For

The Hellcat Was Amazing, But the Hurricane Is, Too

Look, nothing beats the sound of that screaming Hellcat engine’s supercharger whining away atop the cylinder banks, frightening the children and sending neighborhood dogs running when you roared down your suburban street. It was intoxicating. But you paid for that privilege; $100,000 is a lot for a V-8 fuel-to-noise converter. The 3.0-liter Hurricane straight-six turbo high-output (aka SST H/O) engine makes a lot more sense in this application. It’s lighter (by a lot), improves the weight distribution and, according to the Ram folks, changes everything from how the truck handles to how it jumps.

And it’s likely going to sound pretty badass, too, thanks to its freer-flowing intakes and true dual exhaust with an H-pipe and free-flow actuator valves in the mufflers. I’m looking forward to seeing what the sound engineers at Ram have created with this beast; I doubt it’ll be anything like the banshee wail of the TRX’s Hellcat engine, but I betcha it won’t be boring. It’ll have plenty of power, too, with 540 horses and 521 pounds-feet of torque — enough to get the truck flying without a problem. It’s a fantastic, powerful, punchy engine in lesser Ram 1500s that I’ve sampled, and we hope it’s going to be just as amazing here, too.

Being someone who doesn’t have much opportunity to drive off-road at high speeds through the university town of Ann Arbor, Mich., I’m also very interested in what Ram engineers have done with the Bilstein Black Hawk e2 shock absorbers’ tuning for when Sport mode is engaged. According to Ram engineers, it turns the RHO into a “canyon carver,” but how a truck this big, wide and heavy with Goodyear Wrangler Territory A/T tires can be entertaining on-road is something I need to experience. The engineers swear the shock tuning makes it a flat and responsive handler, and I already know that the powertrain is up to the task of entertaining the driver, so I can’t wait to see how Ram has put the “sport” in “sport truck” here.

So Fancy Inside

I’m a little concerned about this truck’s interior, however. Yes, it’s the benchmark in the industry again, with rich materials, immaculate construction, beautiful shapes and easily usable screens and features. But it’s maybe too fancy for what this truck’s role is going to be; take this thing on an open-country blast across some desert scrub with the windows open and you’ll never get the suede seat fabric clean. Even so, I’ll bet a significant portion of these trucks are purchased by people who will never actually go into the dirt; for them, the sumptuous cabin is going to be a place they’ll want to spend quite some time. However, the 10.25-inch passenger screen seems a bit gimmicky; perhaps that money could’ve been better spent on something else.

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They’re Gonna Sell a Ton of ‘Em

So it’s the Raptor fighter we’ve hoped Ram would make for years now, and the brand gave it more power and torque, plus some fun and interesting features, then priced it eight grand cheaper than a base 2024 F-150 Raptor. The starting price for the 2025 Ram 1500 RHO is $71,990 (including $1,995 destination fee). That’s just awesome, and it turns the RHO from the slab of milled unobtanium that the TRX was into something accessible to a lot more buyers. Ram’s going to sell a ton of these things while still leaving the door open to a new TRX that goes even crazier with power, gear and equipment. I can’t wait to see that one, too.

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