The Ford F-150 Raptor is arguably one of the best-looking F-150 trim levels available, but it comes at a steep price – almost double the price of the base-model Ford F-150. It is the high-performance pickup truck of the lineup and has been in production since 2009, making it a relatively new option, with only two generations available. With such a difference in price for what appears to almost be the same truck, it is important to consider if the Raptor really is worth the price.

Is the Raptor really any different?

In the United States, truck-enthusiasts are divided over their preference of trucks: you are either a die-hard Chevrolet fan, a hardcore Ford fan, or a Dodge fanatic. But Ford did a little something special with its most common pickup truck to help it stand out among the competition, and that is the Raptor package. For a starting price of about $53,455 it is not anywhere close to the most expensive pickup truck on the market, but it’s expensive in comparison to the standard F-150.

The large gap in price is a major deterrence for many people, but Raptor owners love the aggressively styling and supposedly greater performance and handling of the Raptor so much that many claims say it’s well worth the price.

As a performance-oriented pickup truck, the Raptor gets worse gas mileage than your standard F-150. With an average of 15mpg in the city and 18mpg on the highway – and that’s not even while towing something – it doesn’t stack up well against the standard version, which offers a reported 20mpg in the city and as much as 26mpg on the highway.

Under the hood, the Raptor has a 3.5L V6 engine, which doesn’t sound too overly impressive considering many people have come to expect V8 – or even V10 – power from some pickup trucks. This V6 still offers snappy acceleration and can hold it’s own with 450hp, a pretty significant power bump from the lower-end models.

Buying on the used market

If you are concerned with the added price of upgrading to the brand new 2020 Ford F-150 Raptor trim, you can always turn to the used truck market for previous model years, or of course, consider the other trim levels available for the 2020 model year.

Because the Raptor has only been in production for a little more than a decade, there aren’t too many variations on the used car market – besides some tastefully modified and even more powerful versions developed privately by companies like Hennessey performance. You can find them used for a fraction of the price of buying one used – as is typically the case with cars with most vehicles, and they’ve done well to hold their value without dropping considerably every time a new model year comes out.

If you mainly like the looks of the Ford F-150 Raptor then there is, of course, a company that makes an aftermarket body kit that will fit right on to your base-model F-150 to give it that ‘Raptor’ look for just a few hundred dollars and some labor.

Most current owners of the Ford F-150 Raptor would probably argue that they are well worth the added cost. While you can get similar styling with some aftermarket parts, they never quite live up to the same performance standards. New or used, upgrading to the Raptor trim might not be a bad idea after all.