Three years after Ram walked away from the small commercial van segment, leaving tradespeople and delivery fleets scrambling, the brand wants back in. The 2027 ProMaster City, revealed this week, is Ram’s mea culpa to every plumber, florist, and shuttle operator it orphaned when it axed the nameplate after 2022.
The timing is no accident. When both Ram and Ford abandoned their compact commercial vans a few years ago, they left a gaping hole in the American market. No domestic option existed for buyers who needed something bigger than a cargo SUV but smaller than a full-size transit van. Ram now admits those customers didn’t just disappear. They took their money elsewhere.
So here comes the new ProMaster City, and it shares nothing with the old one except the badge. It rides on Stellantis’s global mid-size commercial van platform, the same bones under the Fiat Scudo, Citroën Dispatch, and Vauxhall Vivaro. Built in Turkey, powered by a turbocharged 1.6-liter four-cylinder making 166 horsepower and 221 pound-feet of torque through an eight-speed automatic, it drives the front wheels exclusively. No all-wheel-drive option.
The new van is nearly two feet longer than its predecessor, with a wheelbase stretched from 122.4 to 129 inches. Yet Ram claims the turning radius is virtually unchanged, a critical selling point for anyone who’s ever threaded a work van through a downtown loading zone. At just under 77 inches tall, it’s the only Class 2 commercial van that ducks below 80 inches, meaning it fits in parking garages where the big ProMaster and Ford Transit cannot.
The cargo numbers are where this van earns its keep. The squared-off cargo area delivers 167 cubic feet of space, with a load floor over nine feet long and more than 48 inches between the wheel wells. That’s room for 4×8 sheets of plywood or two standard U.S. pallets. Towing capacity lands around 2,000 pounds, with payload slightly above that.
Ram will sell the ProMaster City in two trims, Tradesman and SLT, each available as either a cargo van or a passenger hauler seating five or eight. The cargo version offers full side panels, full glass, or a combination. The passenger van gets an SUV-style liftgate while the cargo version uses 180-degree barn doors.
Standard equipment is generous for a work van priced under $40,000. Every ProMaster City gets a 10-inch digital gauge cluster, a 10-inch touchscreen with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, heated front seats, navigation, and a digital rearview mirror. The SLT adds front parking sensors, wireless charging, body-color bumpers, and alloy wheels in place of the Tradesman’s steelies.
One curious detail: the van debuts Ram’s new logo, the same design that appeared on the now-discontinued electric Ram 1500 REV. The brand’s electrification flagship is gone, but its face lives on — pinched daytime running lights and all — on a Turkish-built work van powered by a Hungarian-built four-cylinder. That’s the state of Stellantis in 2026.
Orders open in the second half of this year, with production beginning in the fourth quarter and U.S. sales expected in early 2027. Ram says the sub-$40,000 starting price already accounts for anticipated import tariffs, a notable caveat given the current trade climate.
Ram left this segment because it didn’t see the money in it. Now it’s spending real capital — new platform, overseas production, tariff absorption — to get back in. The customers were always there. Ram just stopped looking.
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