The defining feature is a gap. Cab and cargo bed are separate structures with a break between them, mounted on a frame that carries both, and everything about how a pickup behaves follows from that layout. The bed takes loads that would deform a car body, the frame tolerates twisting that would crack a unibody, and the price is weight, a high floor and a turning circle set by a wheelbase long enough to hold both boxes.
North America drives the category, where full-size trucks sit at the top of the sales tables year after year and the Chevrolet Silverado, Ford F-250 Super Duty, Toyota Tundra and Nissan Frontier cover the range from heavy work to private use. Electrification is arriving from two directions at once. The Scout Terra is a 5,822 mm full-size truck; the Slate Truck, at 4,435 mm, is a deliberately stripped small one. Elsewhere the bed usually serves a business rather than a household, which is why the mid-size double cab, not the full-size crew cab, is the shape most of the world buys.
