Orders Open, Finally, for Dodge’s Electric Muscle Car

It seems like every week we hear that production of yet another electric car is going slower than its manufacturer promised, and Dodge is no exception. In March, the company said that it would release the Charger Daytona EV in “mid-2024.” After a delay to August, orders opened on Monday, September 16.

There are many good reasons why you’re only now able to order one of these cars. Both the battery- and the gas-powered versions of the new Charger Daytona use a brand-new architecture called STLA Large. (Stellantis, Dodge’s parent company, has designed this platform to be used by many of its brand-children. Jeep is using it for the Wagoneer S, and Alfa Romeo, Chrysler, and Maserati will use it for as-yet-unannounced models.) STLA Large was designed from the outset to accommodate a battery-only powertrain, either 400V or 800V, but it is compatible with various interchangeable suspension modules and powertrain cradles that can accommodate a hybrid or gas-only driveline.

All Charger Daytona EVs are assembled at Windsor Assembly in Ontario with battery modules filled with Samsung cells. Assembly of early/pre-production models has started, though it is not at full capacity. That will arrive “in the near future,” wrote Darren Jacobs in an email. (Jacobs manages communications for Chrysler and Dodge products.)

Launching an all-new architecture is a herculean feat by itself, let alone getting new tooling installed and achieving production volume. Other cooks in the kitchen may have influenced timing, too: Free2Mmove Charge, Stellantis’ charging infrastructure company, not a year and a half old, whose website only launched in July. Then there are the dealers, which must be certified to sell the electric Chargers. This site will help you find the nearest one and see how many orders that dealer has open. Most seem to have only one or two allocations, but the odd location gets up to seven. Coupes will arrive at dealerships in the fourth quarter of 2024.

Which of those many variables is behind the delay? When we asked Dodge for comment, they said, “We have shared that early/pre-production Dodge Charger Daytona vehicles are currently being built at the Windsor Assembly Plant.” What Stellantis has written, Stellantis has written.

For now, you can finally mess around on the configurator, linked here, to get an idea of what the electric Charger will look like.

Our best advice? Pick some other paint color than silver, if you want to stand out. We’ve spotted Charger Daytonas running up and down I-94 in Michigan, and to the untrained eye, they look … well, normal.