2022 Jeep Gladiator

Standard and only gas engine offered on the 2022 Gladiator; the 3.0L EcoDiesel V6 (260 hp) is the sole alternative but this vehicle is scored as the gas powertrain class.

Torque is on the low end for the mid-size truck segment, notably behind rivals like the Toyota Tacoma and GMC Canyon.

Instrumented tests of the JT-generation Gladiator (2020–2022, carryover powertrain) average around 8.0s to 60 mph, with lighter/lower trims quicker and heavier Rubicon slower.

The naturally aspirated Pentastar V6 is smooth and free of turbo lag or hybrid-transition harshness, but reviewers consistently note it has to work hard to move the Gladiator's tall, heavy, aerodynamically blunt body, especially at highway speed and under load.

The ZF-sourced 8-speed automatic (standard on most volume trims) shifts smoothly and rarely hunts; the 6-speed manual is competent but numb, and neither is the segment's best but both are well-sorted.

Best-in-class-adjacent for the segment at launch, achieved with the Max Tow Package on the V6 gas engine.

Payload is modest for the segment and varies significantly by trim and package; the volume trim's typical payload sits well below the class max.

The Gladiator offers a Tow/Haul mode and available rear backup camera with hitch guidance lines, but lacks an integrated trailer brake controller as standard and has no trailer backup steering assist or blind-spot-with-trailer coverage seen on full-size rivals.

4WD is standard across the entire trim lineup (not optional), with a range of sophisticated systems: part-time Command-Trac standard, full-time Selec-Trac available, and the heavy-duty Rock-Trac with locking differentials and low-range on Rubicon.

The Rubicon trim is a genuine off-road specialist: up to 11.1 in of ground clearance, front/rear Tru-Lok locking differentials, electronic sway-bar disconnect, 33-inch off-road tires, and up to 31.5 in of water fording — among the most capable in the mid-size truck class.

Two engine choices for 2022 — the standard 3.6L Pentastar V6 gas and the optional 3.0L EcoDiesel V6 — but no hybrid, PHEV, or EV variant, a narrower spread than segment leaders now offering turbo and hybrid options.

EPA-rated combined economy for the 2022 Gladiator's standard gas V6 with 4WD, the volume configuration.

EPA city rating for the volume automatic-transmission 4WD configuration.

EPA highway rating for the volume automatic-transmission 4WD configuration.

Range is limited relative to the truck segment due to the combination of a modest 22-gallon tank and below-average combined economy.

Annual fuel cost is on the higher side for the mid-size truck segment, consistent with the Gladiator's below-average combined MPG.

The standard 3.6L Pentastar V6 runs on regular unleaded gasoline with no premium requirement; the optional EcoDiesel needs diesel but is not the scored powertrain.

NHTSA has never published a combined overall star rating for the JT-generation Gladiator because it never ran the side-barrier or side-pole tests. The only published results for the 2022 model year are a 4-star frontal (V6 models) and a 3-star rollover rating; this is unchanged across every year of the 2020-on generation.

The 2022 Gladiator falls short in all three of IIHS's current crash tests: Marginal in the updated moderate overlap front, Marginal in the updated side test (no rear side airbag, and the rear dummy's head struck the soft-top support), and Marginal in the driver-side small overlap after the truck tipped onto its passenger side. Roof strength and the original moderate overlap test are Good, but with nothing above Marginal in the current battery a Top Safety Pick is out of reach, and 2022 predates the rear-belt and side-curtain-airbag revisions Jeep added starting with 2024 models.

Not one of the five features this item measures is standard on the volume 2022 Gladiator Sport S: forward collision warning and adaptive cruise are the optional Advanced Safety Group, blind-spot monitoring with rear cross-path is in the separate optional Active Safety Group, and lane keeping and pedestrian AEB are not offered at any price on any trim. Standard active safety is limited to the passive electronic aids — ESC, electronic roll mitigation, trailer-sway control, hill-start assist and brake traction control. In a segment where the Tacoma and Colorado ship an AEB-plus-lane-departure suite on every trim, this is the weakest standard content available.

When ordered, the radar-based Full Speed Forward Collision Warning Plus earns IIHS's top Superior rating for vehicle-to-vehicle front crash prevention, avoiding the collision outright in both the 12 and 25 mph runs — the hardware itself is good. Two things hold the score down: it is optional equipment the volume Sport S does not carry unless the buyer adds the Advanced Safety Group, and pedestrian detection is not offered at all, so there is no daytime or nighttime pedestrian capability to grade.

Blind-Spot Monitoring with Rear Cross Path detection is offered across the 2022 range but is optional on every trim, bundled with rear park assist and LED taillamps in the Active Safety Group, and it is alert-only — no braking or steering intervention, no safe-exit alert, and no trailer-aware coverage. The omission costs more on a truck rated to tow roughly 7,650-7,700 lbs than it would on a crossover, and the Gladiator's narrow body and small, tall side mirrors mean a trailer or wide load blocks the mirror view entirely.

The 2022 Gladiator offers no lane departure warning, no lane keep assist and no lane centering on any trim or in any option package — a gap that is close to unique in the mid-size truck segment, where the Tacoma, Colorado, Ranger and Frontier all include at least a lane departure warning as standard equipment.

Adaptive Cruise Control is capable full-speed-range hardware on automatic-transmission trucks, but it is optional on every 2022 trim as part of the Advanced Safety Group, drops to a lower speed floor if the buyer takes the six-speed manual, and has no lane-centering hardware on the platform to combine with — so there is no highway assist to grade at all.

No hands-free highway driving system is offered on any 2022 Gladiator trim. Stellantis's hands-on Active Driving Assist is not fitted to the JT platform, and with no lane-centering hardware anywhere in the lineup a hands-free system is not technically possible on this truck.

Every 2022 Gladiator headlight configuration IIHS tested rated Marginal or Poor. The best available — LED, whether combined with the Advanced Safety Group's automatic high beams or not — is only Marginal, and the halogen units on the volume trims are Poor regardless of configuration. No configuration offers curve-adaptive lighting.

Forward and lateral sightlines are among the best in the segment — a near-vertical windshield, tall commanding seating, a short flat hood with visible fender corners, and deep side glass — and unlike the Wrangler the spare lives under the bed rather than on the tailgate, so the mirror-and-glass rear view is clearer. The compromises are the truck's overall length making the tail hard to place, small tall narrow mirrors that a wide trailer blocks outright, a notable over-the-shoulder blind spot at the sport bar and rear header, rear park sensors that are optional rather than standard, and no surround-view camera on any trim.

IIHS rates the Gladiator's LATCH hardware Acceptable — two complete positions plus a center position that can borrow lower anchors — a grade below the 4-door Wrangler's Good+, and the four real doors open wide enough to work with. Against that, the rear bench is upright with limited legroom so a rear-facing seat squeezes the front passenger, the high step-in height makes lifting a child into a seat harder than in a crossover, and three seats across is tight in a body this narrow.

Crew cab, four-door Gladiator seats 5 across all 2022 trims.

Manufacturer spec sheet lists front headroom with the more common hardtop configuration; soft-top models measure higher.

Consistent across 2021-2025 manufacturer spec sheets; among the tightest front legroom figures in the mid-size truck class.

Wrangler-derived cabin carries tall, boxy headroom front and rear; hardtop figure used as the more common configuration.

Crew-cab-only Gladiator has genuinely usable rear legroom for a mid-size truck, ahead of most two-cab-style competitors.

Gladiator offers a single 5-foot bed across all trims, short relative to the class's normalization band which includes 6.5-8 ft full-size beds.

Short 5-ft bed volume sits at the low end of the truck normalization band, which spans up to full-size long-bed configurations.

Trail Rail cargo management system in the bed and standard under-seat/console storage are useful, but the Wrangler-derived cabin lacks standout storage innovation seen in newer trucks.

Front seats are supportive enough for daily use but not praised as segment-leading; cloth seats on base trims are basic.

Solid front axle and off-road-tuned suspension produce a busy, jittery ride on broken pavement, a widely-documented Gladiator weakness versus independent-front-suspension mid-size rivals.

Removable doors/roof and boxy aerodynamics produce more wind and road noise than conventional mid-size trucks.

Heated front seats and heated steering wheel are available via the Cold Weather Group option, but not standard, and rear climate/ventilated seats are absent.

Entry Sport trim base price; sources vary $35.3k–$37.6k depending on whether destination and mid-2022 price bumps are included.

Overland is the mid-pack volume trim most reviewers use as the representative Gladiator — comfort/tech-focused without Rubicon's off-road premium; Sport S and Willys are close seconds.

Edmunds' True Cost to Own model for the 2022 Gladiator runs above the truck-segment norm; CarEdge separately flags the Gladiator as costlier to maintain than midsize-truck rivals.

Estimates cluster around 63–68% retention (32–37% depreciation), roughly in line with or slightly behind the midsize-truck segment average (~70% retention), which is still strong versus cars/SUVs broadly.

Industry-standard basic coverage, at the low end of the truck-segment 3–5 yr band; no extended basic coverage offered.

Standard 5-year/60,000-mile powertrain coverage for the gas V6 (the scored powertrain), at the low end of the 5–10 yr segment band — well short of Hyundai/Kia's 10-year benchmark.

Jeep Wave includes a short 2-year/2-service complimentary maintenance package (two oil changes, two tire rotations) plus 24/7 roadside assistance, trip-interruption coverage up to $1,000, and loaner/rental support — but the free-service window is brief and there are no charging credits or multi-year maintenance plan, placing it in the 'short included-maintenance + basic roadside' band.

$46,570 volume-trim price minus its estimated resale value after 5 years (65% retained, or about $30,271) leaves about $16,300 in depreciation. Add the projected $9,995 in 5-year maintenance and repairs, and owning this vehicle for 5 years costs about $26,295 in total.

Consumer Reports rates the 2022 Gladiator below average and singles it out as the only midsize pickup on its unreliable list for the class, citing recurring suspension/steering, driveline and axle complaints; this outweighs J.D. Power's more generic brand-level 'Great' consumer rating.

Jeep sits in the bottom tier of J.D. Power's Vehicle Dependability Study and ACSI brand satisfaction (75 vs. a 79 mass-market average), a multi-year pattern rather than a single bad model year.

The 2022 Gladiator carries roughly seven NHTSA recall campaigns for this generation including a seat-belt pretensioner welding defect, a diesel high-pressure fuel pump that can stall the engine, a transmission park-pawl issue, and a rearview-camera/reverse-light fault — a heavier-than-typical and safety-relevant recall load, though none is a widescale fire or major structural failure.

The standard 3.6L Pentastar V6 is a well-proven, high-volume engine family (10M+ units produced by 2020) with a solid long-mileage track record in the Wrangler/Grand Cherokee; owner complaints on the Gladiator skew toward the 8-speed automatic rather than the engine itself.

Reviewers describe a utilitarian cabin mixing hard, durable plastics with some soft-touch panels and solid switchgear — acceptable for the price and off-road mission but not class-leading for a premium-priced truck.

Consumer Reports and owner forums flag recurring squeaks, rattles, wind noise and weatherstripping/seal complaints alongside the well-documented 'death wobble' front-end shake, offsetting some owner praise for assembly versus older domestic trucks.

Stellantis/Jeep dealers are dense and widespread across the US, but brand-level service satisfaction runs below the mass-market average, giving adequate coverage with a mixed reputation rather than a standout service experience.

The Wrangler-derived platform benefits from a huge off-road aftermarket and widely stocked parts, but Jeep-brand average annual repair cost runs above the industry norm, netting out to roughly normal-to-slightly-elevated ownership cost.

Volume/high-take-rate trims (Overland, Rubicon, Mojave) get the 8.4-inch Uconnect 4C standard; base trims use a smaller 7-inch unit. Small relative to the truck normalization band, which stretches to 18.5-inch systems in newer trucks.

Uconnect's menu logic and physical knob/button balance are consistently praised even as the underlying hardware ages; response times are adequate rather than fast.

The 2022 Gladiator's Uconnect 4/4C systems support Apple CarPlay and Android Auto only via wired USB connection; no wireless projection was offered until the Uconnect 5 update arrived on later Wrangler/Gladiator models.

Uconnect voice commands handle basic requests reliably and the 8.4-inch system's native nav is serviceable, though most owners still default to phone projection for mapping.

A 9-speaker Alpine premium audio system is available on upper trims (standard with the 8.4-inch radio group), a genuine step up from the base speaker set.

Gladiator uses a mostly analog gauge cluster with a configurable 7-inch color driver information display in the center, not a full digital cluster; available broadly but limited in scope.

Uconnect of this generation supports map and some software updates via USB or dealer visit; whole-vehicle over-the-air updates were not a Gladiator feature in 2022.

The Uconnect app offers remote start, lock/unlock and vehicle locate, but full functionality requires an ongoing Uconnect Access subscription after the trial period.

Gladiator offers USB-A ports front and rear plus a 115V household outlet on some trims, but wireless charging and USB-C are not broadly standard for the 2022 model year.

Proximity keyless entry and remote start are available on mid-and-up trims but not standard on the base Sport, and there is no phone-as-key option.

A rearview camera is standard and rear park-assist sensors are available, but there is no surround/360-degree camera; Rubicon's TrailCam is a forward off-road camera, not a parking aid.

No head-up display is offered on any 2022 Gladiator trim.

Four full doors and crew-cab rear seats support LATCH-equipped car seats, but the tall step-in height, removable-door/roof design, and firm rear bench make daily family loading more effortful than a crossover or SUV.

Adaptive cruise control, forward collision warning, and blind-spot monitoring are optional on the affordable Sport/Overland trims and only standard on the pricier Rubicon, so family buyers on a budget trim can miss key ADAS.

Rear legroom is genuinely usable for a mid-size truck, but elevated wind/road noise and a busy ride over long stints reduce family road-trip comfort.

Vague, heavy steering and a tall, live-axle chassis make stop-and-go traffic and crosswind highway driving more tiring than in a typical daily driver.

EPA-rated 17/22/19 mpg city/highway/combined for the standard 3.6L V6 automatic is well below efficient commuter norms even for a mid-size truck.

A long wheelbase (crew cab plus 5-ft bed) yields one of the largest turning circles in the mid-size truck class (44.5-45.0 ft curb-to-curb), making it noticeably harder to park and maneuver in tight urban settings.

Best-in-class-for-its-class towing (up to 7,650 lbs) and payload (up to 1,700 lbs) with the factory tow package give the Gladiator genuine work-truck headroom despite its short bed.

Shares its proven Pentastar V6/8-speed drivetrain and solid axles with the long-running Wrangler, but as a nameplate only in production since 2020 it lacks the multi-decade fleet reputation of full-size work trucks.

The Trail Rail cargo management system, bed tie-downs and available spray-in bedliner support light upfitting, but the short 5-ft bed and lack of a RamBox-style lockable storage system limit heavier jobsite use.

A 22-gallon tank and 19 mpg combined give roughly 400 miles of highway range, but elevated cabin noise and a busy ride limit sustained comfort on long hauls.

Removable doors and roof, available Rubicon (Rock-Trac 4.0:1 low range, locking differentials, sway-bar disconnect) and Mojave (desert-tuned Fox suspension) variants make the Gladiator a genuine off-road and overlanding standout.

The open pickup bed with Trail Rail system swallows bulky gear that would not fit in an SUV, though there's no frunk, underfloor storage or fold-flat cabin surface, and doors-off/top-off storage adds hassle.

The tall, solid front-axle suspension and off-road tires permit significant body lean and a harsh, jittery response on pavement — a genuine dynamics penalty versus independent-front-suspension mid-size rivals.

Steering is widely described as vague and imprecise, worsened on taller-tire trims like Rubicon and Mojave, requiring driver attention in crosswinds and ruts.

Brakes provide adequate, unremarkable stopping power appropriate for a body-on-frame mid-size truck; no notable fade or pedal-feel complaints in reviews.

The 3.6L Pentastar V6 paired with the 8-speed automatic is a smooth, well-calibrated combination with minimal shift harshness or lag.

The V6 is audible under load but not harsh or droning; wind and road noise from the boxy body are more noticeable than powertrain noise itself.

Curb-to-curb turning diameter for the volume Sport/Overland configuration; larger on Rubicon and Mojave due to wider off-road tires.

A commanding, upright seating position and good outward visibility are Gladiator strengths, offset by a tall step-in height and controls carried over from the Wrangler.

Removable doors and roof, open-air driving, and strong off-road character give the Gladiator genuine enthusiast appeal, even though on-pavement dynamics are unremarkable.

The 2022 refresh added a standard 7-inch touchscreen (Uconnect 4) to the base Sport, plus removable doors/roof and 4x4 as standard — competitive for the segment, but rivals like the Ford Ranger and Toyota Tacoma match or beat base-trim equipment at a lower price, and items like an 8.4-inch screen or leather require moving well up the Gladiator lineup.

No rival offers the Gladiator's combination of a full pickup bed with a removable roof/doors and Wrangler-grade solid-axle off-road hardware, which is genuine differentiated value — but the Gladiator starts several thousand dollars above Tacoma/Ranger/Colorado for similar payload/towing, so it's a premium-for-uniqueness proposition rather than an outright bargain.

Nine trims for 2022 (Sport, Willys Sport, Sport S, Altitude, Willys, Overland, Rubicon, Mojave, High Altitude) span work-adjacent to loaded and add two distinct off-road specialists (rock-crawling Rubicon, desert-running Mojave), plus an optional EcoDiesel — a genuinely wide spread, but every trim is a single 4-door crew cab/5-foot-bed body, unlike rivals offering multiple cab and bed-length combinations.

77,855 units sold in 2022, down from a 2021 peak of 89,712 — a steady mid-pack midsize-truck seller, well behind segment leader Tacoma but ahead of Frontier and Colorado in most years.

Jeep carries one of the strongest off-road/lifestyle brand halos in the US market, and the Gladiator directly inherits Wrangler's cult following and enthusiast loyalty, which supports both showroom draw and resale.

2022 was a low-inventory, high-demand year industry-wide, and the Gladiator's enthusiast/niche demand kept it selling close to MSRP with minimal discounting compared to mainstream competitors.

The JT-generation Gladiator launched for MY2020, making 2022 its third model year — current-generation with a mid-cycle equipment bump (standard 7-in touchscreen on Sport) rather than a ground-up redesign, and not yet showing its age.

Reviewers consistently praise the Gladiator's unmatched off-road capability and open-air versatility, but it regularly finishes behind Tacoma/Ranger/Colorado in mainstream comparison tests on ride quality, on-road refinement and value — a well-regarded niche pick rather than a broad class winner.