Written by Cláudio Afonso | LinkedIn | X
Deliveries of Lucid Motors‘ long-anticipated Gravity SUV face continued delays, with early production hampered by safety issues, a person familiar with the launch plans told EV on Wednesday.
The Gravity, first unveiled in November 2023 at the LA Auto Show, has yet to reach customer hands despite production having started in December. The first pre-production unit was driven in July by then-Chief Executive Officer Peter Rawlinson, who later announced the official production kickoff in a LinkedIn post on December 5.
“Production of the Lucid Gravity is now underway at our factory in Arizona,” Rawlinson wrote.
While a limited number of units were delivered to employees their families at the end of 2024, a broader customer rollout remained unclear—until last week.
Lucid’s interim CEO, Marc Winterhoff, said the company now expects to begin Gravity deliveries to U.S. customers “by the end of April.” “And by the end of April, we will resume customer deliveries of the Gravity,” he said during an event held last week in front of Lucid’s showroom in New York City.
Winterhoff added that the company has not yet completed production of the higher-end Grand Touring trim, which starts just under $95,000 and opened for orders last November.
“We nearly finished building all of the vehicles that we wanted to build to put them into our studio and for test drives,” he said, without citing a reason for the delays.
But behind the scenes, progress has been stymied by unresolved issues, according to the person familiar with the matter. The Gravity has not yet passed safety testing for its third-row seating, which still needs to be verified, the person said.
Lucid has not issued delivery targets for the Gravity. However, the same person said April volumes would be “very small,” and that higher-volume output likely won’t begin until “June or July.”
Winterhoff, who became interim CEO in February after Rawlinson transitioned to a strategic advisory role, previously led the Lucid account at consulting firm Roland Berger, where he was a leading Lucid’s account. He joined the EV maker as Chief Operating Officer in December 2023, reporting directly to Rawlinson.
The same person said Winterhoff helped shape the company’s long-term strategy in 2023, which included long-term targets of selling 60,000 Lucid Air sedans and 40,000 Gravity SUVs annually. Lucid’s formal production guidance for 2025 stands at approximately 20,000 vehicles, equivalent to 20% of the target.
For its next model, a yet-to-be-named midsize EV slated for late 2026, Winterhoff and his team at Roland Berger discussed internal production targets ranging from 150,000 to 500,000 units annually. The vehicle, teased for the first time last September, appears to be a crossover SUV with Lucid planning to price it just below $50,000.
Despite Gravity’s production start in December, customer test drives have also not yet begun. Winterhoff said test drives will launch in the second half of April.
“Also, you will see probably around mid-April some media reviews because we’re conducting extensive media test drives in the first half of April. And then after that in the second half of April, we will then start test drives for our customers,” he said.
Lucid previously highlighted its safety testing efforts in August, publishing a video showing crash tests for the Gravity SUV. “To make it ready for everything in your life, Lucid Gravity was methodically tested in thousands of simulations and hundreds of real-world collisions, so you can travel with confidence in the best SUV ever,” the company wrote in the video description.
Lucid Air Safety Tests
The company’s first model, the Lucid Air, earned a five-star safety rating from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s New Car Assessment Program for 2025. It received five stars in frontal crash, side impact, and rollover resistance categories.
In Europe, the 2022 Air also scored five stars in Euro NCAP testing, with 90% for adult occupant protection, 91% for child occupants, 78% for vulnerable road users, and 84% for safety assist systems.
US Sales Milestone
Lucid posted record U.S. sales in March with 942 units delivered, according to estimates from Motor Intelligence. That figure includes 912 Lucid Air sedans and 30 Gravity SUVs, pushing first-quarter domestic deliveries above 2,400 units.
The company is expected to release its first quarter production and delivery figures over the next few days.
Separately, Winterhoff told Fox Business on Saturday that about half of new Lucid buyers are former Tesla customers.
“We are seeing a lot of customers coming from Tesla,” he said, as Elon Musk’s company faces growing scrutiny and reported vandalism incidents across the U.S., Canada and Europe.
