We spied Chevrolet’s upcoming small truck for South America in March this year and the product is finally ready to make its full and official debut. The second generation Montana shares its platform with the Chevy Onix, Onix Plus, and Tracker, which means it rides on a unibody chassis like the Ford Maverick and Hyundai Santa Cruz. The Montana is now available for orders in Brazil with the first deliveries planned for February next year.
The small pickup truck doesn’t have aspirations to be extraordinary off the road. Instead, Chevy focuses on the performance on the road and promises the Montana is “the SUV you need in the pickup truck you dreamed of.” Or, setting aside the marketing language, the model offers the best interior space in Brazil’s small truck segment, as well as a completely isolated truck bed that doesn’t allow water and dust to enter the cargo space, just like in a regular vehicle trunk. There’s an optional electric bed cover, too.
Gallery: 2023 Chevrolet Montana
As a more lifestyle-oriented truck, the Montana doesn’t come with an all-wheel-drive system – you can’t have it even as an option as opposed to the Fiat Toro, which is one of the new truck’s competitors in Brazil. There’s also just a single engine available – a 1.2-liter turbocharged three-cylinder mill shared with the Chevy Tracker. Power is routed to the front wheels via either a six-speed manual gearbox or a six-speed automatic. The peak output is 133 horsepower (98 kilowatts), which matches the maximum power of the Tracker.
In terms of dimensions, the Montana is smaller than the Toro. At 185.8 inches (4.72 meters )long, it is 8.66 inches (22 cm) shorter. The cargo area can swallow up to 30.8 cubic-feet (874 liters), whereas the Toro has a 33.08 cu-ft (937-liter) boot volume. To a certain extent, the Montana is more closely positioned against the Renault Oroch, which has similar dimensions and a slightly smaller cargo area.
In Brazil, the 2023 Montana goes on sale with prices starting at 134,490 Brazilian real, which is around $25,800 at the current exchange rates. There's no indication that Chevy could bring the model to the US market, though.
