What’s the Difference between Pickup Cabs?

What’s the Difference between Pickup Cabs?

Despite their popularity, full-size trucks are only sold by a handful of different auto brands, led by the Chevrolet Silverado, Ford F-150, GMC Sierra, Nissan Titan, RAM 1500, and Toyota Tundra. Yet you still can find an amazing number of choices out there since these trucks are available in multiple cab styles, with multiple engine/drivetrain combinations, and with multiple bed lengths, making for an almost overwhelming number of potential configurations.

Most of that’s fairly easy to figure out, but cab types can be a little tricky because their names aren’t obvious. Here’s how to decode the three basic styles – regular cab, double cab, and crew cab – used by pickup trucks of all sizes today.

What Is a Regular Cab Pickup?

A “regular cab” truck refers to a pickup with just two doors and a single row of seating, often a bench seat. These are generally considered work trucks, and shoppers should know that used models can often come with pretty low levels of standard equipment. In fact, some entry-level regular cab trucks had manual windows, manual door locks, and two-speaker radios up through 2020. So if you’re looking for a regular cab truck with premium amenities, be sure to look carefully.

What Is a Double Cab?

A “double cab” pickup is longer than a regular cab, but it’s important to understand that the former is not actually double the size of the latter. The bigger cab has an additional set of doors, but they’re not full-size doors, and in most cases, the back doors are hinged at the rear, not the front. It creates an especially wide, pillar-free cab opening that some owners really like for its easy access.

Double cab trucks also have room for a second row of seats, although again with a bit of a compromise due to space restraints. The back row of a double cab pickup is best suited for kids and small adults, who will typically find two rear jump seats, with fold-up/down bottoms. Older trucks would occasionally have their rear jump seats sideways, too, so passengers had their backs to the cab walls.

This is where things can get confusing, too, since three brands have their own special names for their double cab trucks:

• Ford F-150 SuperCab

• RAM 1500 Quad Cab

• Nissan Titan King Cab

What Is a Crew Cab?

The largest of the traditional truck cab styles is the “crew cab,” which has enough room for front and rear bench seats and a total passenger capacity of up to six – with surprising comfort even for adults in the back. For example, some of the full-size crew cab pickups showcase more rear legroom than some full-size luxury sedans. And as with the double cab pickups, a couple of brands have gotten creative with the names of their crew cab models, including the Ford F-150 SuperCrew and Toyota Tundra CrewMax

What is an Extended Cab?

While regular, double, and crew are the basic cab styles for full-size trucks, smaller trucks can add another layer of complexity to the name game. Pickups like the Chevrolet Colorado, Ford Ranger, GMC Canyon, Nissan Frontier, and Toyota Tacoma still offer two different four-door cab styles. However, the smaller ones, comparable to full-size double cabs, are known generally as extended cabs or access cabs. (The Frontier King Cab and Ranger SuperCab get unique signifiers for their extended cab versions.)

These models are available as crew cabs as well, with four conventional doors and extra room in the back for more comfort. However, unlike full-size crew cabs, these smaller crew cabs still have significantly less legroom in the rear than in the front, reserving the back row for kids and smaller adults.

Now that you know more about truck cabs, you can start shopping here, start selling here, and enjoy the whole HMSMC site from wherever you have an Internet connection.