2023 GMC Sierra 1500 Diesel

RYAN ZUMMALLEN: The GMC Sierra 1500, here it is in all its glory. For years we consider the Sierra kind of an also-ran against competitors like the Ford F-150 and RAM 1500. But for 2022, there are a whole gang of new upgrades. Everything from styling to tech to this, the new Denali ultimate trim, with an $80,000 price tag, hoo! Today, we're going to test this as well as the new off-road AT4X version to see just how far the Sierra 1500 has come. Stick around, I think you're going to like this. But while you're waiting, do me a favor real quick and hit Like and click Subscribe so you can see all of our videos before your friends. And if you want to sell your car, go to edmunds.com/sellmycar and you will get a cash offer right away. Today, we have the Denali Ultimate and the AT4X, but keep in mind that all Sierra 1500 get updated for 2022. That means they all get new styling, they all get an upgraded interior, and a lot more. - Another big move is that GMC has said goodbye to the V6 engine that came standard last year. Taking over its spot is a turbocharged four cylinder, which has now been upgraded. Base models are called the Pro, and those start at around $32,000. But that's almost strictly a work truck, so we think most consumers will start from the SLE trim level at 44,000. But today is all about the big dogs. Hey buddy, wanna be in the video? - Here's our first big dog, the Sierra AT4X. You start with a Sierra AT4, add some off-road goodies for better capability, and voila, AT4X. It starts right up against $75,000, hoo, hoo boy. And we'll take it on some nasty terrain to see how it does. RYAN ZUMMALLEN: Finally at the top of the lineup is the Denali Ultimate. Now the luxurious Denali has been popular on the Sierra for a long time, so does this new Denali Ultimate take that luxury to even greater heights? At $80,000 plus, it had better. There's no real direct comparison in this class for a Denali Ultimate. The highest level Ford F-150 cost much less, and the highest level RAM 1500 costs even less than that. But with the Denali Ultimate. You get all kinds of standard goodies like four wheel drive, the carbon pro box, and the multi pro tailgate. But there's a lot more to show you, especially inside. So let's get to it. Inside this truck, immediately there are a lot of elements that we recognize from the redesigned Chevy Silverado that we saw a few weeks back. And that's a good thing, that truck left a really nice impression on me with its refreshed interior. But the Sierra is supposedly a step up from the Silverado, and the Denali Ultimate is several steps above that. So let me show you five things that make the Ultimate the ultimate. First is the use of really high quality leather. GMC says this is full grain leather, on the seats, yes, but also on the center console and on the door armrests as well as down here. That's a lot of really nice leather and it feels really good to the touch. The second thing is that those same seats in the front are both heated and ventilated, plus there's 16 way power adjustment, and there's massage function in both of them. It's pretty ultimate. The next thing is actually my guilty pleasure and it's a higher quality carpeted floor mat, which surprisingly feels really, really nice on your feet. And following up on that, there's also a real genuine suede headliner all the way through the top of the ceiling. Suede headliner, on a pickup truck, never heard of that before. Finally, and this is the real key point for me, there is laser etching all throughout the interior that shows the elevation of Denali, you know that enormous mountain in Alaska? Yeah that one. So it shows the elevation of that mountain up here in the open pore wood, here in the center console, and on various badges, in the interior as well as the exterior of the truck. And that's the kind of thing that really shows an attention to detail that I would expect from something with this price tag. Its interior is much less, "I'm a cowboy," and much more, "I own the Cowboys." However, if I were an oil magnate who owned a professional football team, I might be just a little bit disappointed in some of these plastic buttons that are just a little bit flimsy, as well as this giant plastic shield around the center touchscreen. But even with that, it's clear that GMC prioritized putting the really nice materials on the touch points that you're going to be using every single day. And even if there's a little bit of plastic, I think that was the right move. Let's talk tech. Now the refreshed Chevy Silverado and the 22 Sierra share a lot of technology equipment, which is not necessarily a bad thing. For instance, you get this really nice 13.4 inch center touchscreen, which is very easy to use and clear and easy to see too. In our testing, this has been very well received so far. One of the reasons is native Google Maps, which work really well and are great at finding locations. And then ahead of that, there's a 15 inch heads up display, which is great for showing your speed and directions without having to take your eyes off of the road. Finally, because this is a Denali Ultimate, you get Super Cruise Standard. Now Super Cruise is the name for General Motor's hands free driver assistance technology, and we'll show you more about that later. But what it means for the interior is you get this driver attention monitor, which will tell you if you need to pay more attention to the road, and this light bar on the steering wheel, which gives you the status of Super Cruise. Pretty neat stuff inside, let's see how it drives. OK, we're finally behind the wheel of the Denali Ultimate and it certainly makes a good first impression. That is because under the hood, you get the big engine standard. That's the 6.2 liter V8 with 420 horsepower, 460 pound feet of torque, delicious. You can also opt for a turbo diesel, but this V8 is the engine that the vast majority of Denali Ultimate buyers are going to go with. No surprise here, there is a lot of power underfoot. It's kind of nice that the Denali Ultimate can do this kind of two headed act, where it's a super luxurious truck inside and then just a really honkin' tough truck under the hood. On the Denali and Denali Ultimate, you get something called Denali premium suspension, I just said Denali so many times. Anyway, what that means is that you get adaptive dampers and they are constantly reading the road and adjusting themselves so that it smooths out and you get a comfortable ride. So far, I have to say they're working very impressively. On the Denali Ultimate, you get standard 22 inch rims, and when the wheels are that big, you can often feel a whole lot of jittering and bouncing around. But this is smoothing out the road very nicely. But you know, it's not perfect. The Denali premium suspension is soft and comfortable, but it's not the most advanced system out there. For instance, it's not one of those forward facing cameras that can read the road ahead and adjust accordingly. Instead, the dampers are just reacting to whatever the road is doing to them at any moment. So you do get some thumping, you do get some bumps, it's just not making the truck bounce around a whole lot. Look, this is a very nice suspension, I'm just not sure its ultimate. We're cruising along now. OK, this is not my first time using Super Cruise, but it is my first time in a Sierra. There it goes. Handling this curve around the freeway with no problem. So if I take my eyes off the road for too long, I'll get some flashes and some beeps and some warnings that I need to pay attention again. And if for any reason the truck decides I need to take over, it'll do the same thing, it'll give me alerts so that I do that. But this system can also make automatic lane changes. If I hit the blinker it can automatically go into the change for me, but on top of that, if the truck recognizes that it needs to make a change, it can do that regardless of whether I signaled or not. So for instance, if I'm coming up on a slower car and the truck decides it can go around it in order to maintain its speed, it will do that. And the same for merging lanes and other situations like that. So that's an added layer of capability in Super Cruise that is being introduced on the Sierra now. But as far as this goes, it's great. I can sit back and be very, very comfortable on this drive. Still paying attention, of course. OK, here we go. All right, so it just did it a lane change all by itself, I didn't signal or anything. But one thing that it did let me know, it gave me a warning that it was going to do an automatic lane change, and it also gave me a buzz on my butt through the seat bottom on the right side. And that indicates that it's going to do that to the right. Sometimes it's very alarming to get buzzes and pings and warnings that you have to read, but if you get used to the idea that, hey, a buzz on the right side of your butt means I'm going right, and a buzz on the left side means I'm going left, cool. I like that a lot better, actually. Now this feels ultimate, I will give it that. Super Cruise with this level of functionality on a pickup truck. Uh oh, and see, I can just take over-- there was an obstacle in the road, it looked like a tree or something, so I just went around it real quick. Once I took my hands off the steering wheel, Super Cruise just engaged right where it left off. Very nicely done. Now we're going to throw you for a real loop. I am towing a 5,000 pound trailer behind me and I'm now going to activate Super Cruise. Light is green and we are now towing with hands free assistance. I'm terrified and also I love it, and also I'm terrified. So that trailer is big enough that you could definitely feel it while I was hauling. Truck wasn't having a problem with it, but you can definitely feel it's there. And now to activate a computer system and then take your hands off the wheel and your feet off the pedals, while hauling a trailer that size is really an experience, I can tell you that. But here's the thing, I thought it was going to be disconcerting and worrisome, and now that we're doing it, I feel pretty good about it. Truck just slowed itself down to crawling speeds with no problem. Speeding up again no problem. So trailer capability with Super Cruise is brand new on the Sierra, it has not been offered on other vehicles before, so this is its first application in the new Sierra. Expect it to get to other vehicles shortly, I would imagine, but this is cool. Now we can see Super Cruise starting to add new layers, new capabilities, new things you can do with it and that is pretty neat. So on a long trip, it would be reasonable to expect, OK, I'm not going to be able to use Super Cruise while I tow my toy hauler out to the desert, but now you can. And that's kind of a game changer, I really like that. Hold on, let me just hit my massaging seats button here and, oh yeah, now I'm hands free towing while getting a massage. OK, that's ultimate, that's ultimate. I'm into this. So one small caveat to know when you have Super Cruise and you're towing, it cannot do automatic lane changes. So it's not going to go around cars for you, you are going to have to take control of the wheel and the truck to do that yourself. But that seems like a small price to pay to be able to tow hands free. A larger caveat is that Super Cruise is part of a subscription package. Now it's included for three years, but after that three year period, if you want to continue having Super Cruise, you need to pay to add on more time. I feel like that shouldn't be the case. If you are shelling out the big bucks for Denali Ultimate and it comes with Super Cruise, it should just come with Super Cruise. I don't see why you need to, for lack of a better term, nickel and dime your buyers into having them add on more years. It's got it, it should just have it. So kudos GM on Super Cruise with trailer and capability, that is rad. However, putting it into a subscription package and making people add more time, I don't know, might come off just a little bit thirsty. Not really a good look. Now let's do some offroading. I have switched into the GMC Sierra AT4X and what that means is it's the most off road capable version of the Sierra. So think of it like this, Chevy has the Silverado Trail Boss, and GMC has the AT4. Then Chevy has the ZR2 and GMC has the AT4X, which is what we're in now. ZR2, AT4X are very similar, but they are not the same. We drove the ZR2 to a couple of weeks back, so if you want to see a video on the more hardcore version of this truck, go check that out. But today is AT4X day. Now it is not as hardcore as the ZR2 like I mentioned, and there are a couple of reasons for that. For instance, the GMC version has a more plush interior with lots of soft rubbers and foams, just makes it feel a little bit more premium in here than the hardcore ZR2. You also get some changes like a more street worthy front bumper, instead of the dramatic high approach angle bumper in the ZR2. The AT4X also has different tires, they are a size down from 33 inches to 32 inches on this truck, and the less aggressive compound as well. Mud terrain tires in the ZR2, all terrain tires on this truck. But you get the same multimatic DSSV dampers, which are very helpful for suspension cushioning and ride comfort. You get the same front and rear lockers, and you get lots of the same technology, such as one pedal offroading, which is very cool. So once you switch into terrain mode, which is the most aggressive off-road drive setting, you don't need to ride the brake going up or down. The truck will slow itself if you come off the throttle, which I'm about to demonstrate now. So let's check it out. So same 6.2 liter V8 engine providing lots of power as we go up, and there are some pretty big ruts and bumps on this trail. And even though our tires are smaller, we have a little bit less ground clearance than the ZR2, a little bit of scrape there on the rockers. The truck is really moving up nicely. It does feel like there's a little bit more rocking, a little bit more drama than in the ZR2. Whoa, pretty dramatic angle there. But considering that was a pretty hardcore hill with some serious obstacles and this is a quote unquote "luxury off road truck," that was pretty nice. The rockers did their job, truck is protected, and I had my seat massagers on the entire time. I can live with that. All right, now we are about to tackle a descent called "Diablo Dropoff," so you know it's serious. They only name things after Satan when it's serious. OK, we've got a pretty steep decline here. Right, now we're looking at 15 degrees descent, which is quite a lot for a full sized truck. This is where it comes in real handy that those exhaust tips are tucked up behind the rear bumper, which is real nice, so they won't scratch. But you can hear the protective side rockers doing their work. Thank goodness for them. I'm also utilizing one pedal, so I'm not riding the break going down, I'm just applying throttle when it's needed. And dang, I remember when I said this was not as capable as a ZR2, well you could fool a lot of people on this course here. Now we get to go up. We're going up a 20 degree incline right now, no trouble. Oh this is just easy man. Big V8 just sending me constant power, no struggle, and we made real quick work of that very intimidating hill. So we've established that the AT4X is a pretty tough truck, but I still find it in kind of a weird position. First of all, if you did watch my ZR2 video, you know that I had a few issues. Now there are things I liked, like the exhaust tips being tucked up and hidden away, that is on this truck as well. There are other things it didn't like so much, like the suspension shock towers hanging down pretty low and being exposed, that's on this truck as well. And the AT4X costs a pretty astounding $74,000. That's more money than a Raptor and a whole lot more money than the direct competitors to this truck, things like a Toyota Tundra TRD Pro, Ford F-150 Tremor, Ram Rebel, things like that. That said, those trucks aren't really anything like this truck, because this is combining off road capability with a more premium interior and ride comfort. So yes, it's got an expensive price tag, but it's also kind of in a league of its own. OK, so the difficulty I'm having with the Sierra AT4X is the price tag. $75,000 is a lot of money for a truck, especially when you can get a more extreme ZR2 for less money. However, if you are willing to pay that much, this is a very, very comfortable truck that is more civilized on the street, and we just showed can do some pretty hairy stuff off road. So I guess it comes down to, are you willing to pay 75 grand? If so, I think you'll really like the AT4X. And if not, the ZR2 is right there for you. Now I do have issues with both trucks, I think they could have gone a little bit further if they were going to make extreme offroading the focus. However, the AT4X is a pretty nice mixture of capability and luxury. The question is, do you think it's 5 grand or 10 grand or 15 grand better than its competition? That's a tough question to ask yourself. Well, that's our impression of the new top two trim levels on the Sierra, the Denali Ultimate and the AT4X. So what do we think? These two trucks are marking a new era for the Sierra, they're pushing the boundaries of luxury and capability for the GMC brand. We are especially impressed with the Denali Ultimate and its standard Super Cruise function while towing, how awesome is that? But the biggest gains for the 2022 Sierra may come on lower, more affordable trims than these. For instance, on all trims you now get more standard horsepower and a refreshed interior that looks really nice. Plus, lots of available technology features like the really cool screens in there. And features like that could elevate the Sierra out of its also-ran status, to being a pretty solid offering in the full size class. The star, however, is undoubtedly the Denali Ultimate. That is one pricey truck, but it somehow lives up to its billing. I mean, standard Super Cruise, the carbon composite box, and intricate interior chock full of personality, adaptive suspension, driving that thing is a delight if you're willing to pay for it. Now I'm a little less enthused about our friend the AT4X here, given that it faces some of the same pitfalls as the ZR2 and it has a higher price tag. Now there's lots of capability here, so if you're looking for a little bit more off road fun than the standard AT4, here you go. Just prepare yourself for the price tag. Either way you cut it, we're going to have to start paying closer attention to the Sierra 1500 after this refresh. So stay tuned to this channel to see when we're able to bring in a Sierra 1500 for our full range of testing, that way we can see how it stacks up against competitors like the Ford F-150, the Ram 1500, the Toyota Tundra, et cetera, et cetera. Until then, thanks for watching. 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