2026 Heavy-Duty Truck Towing Ratings and Hitch Guide

Ford publishes the highest 2026 heavy-duty tow rating among the four brands compared here, 40,000 lbs for a dual-rear-wheel gooseneck setup with the 40K Gooseneck Tow Package. Ford and Ram say these ratings follow SAE J2807; Chevrolet and GMC do not say. Your hitch must be rated for the loaded trailer.

How makers set heavy-duty towing ratings

A tow rating is the maximum trailer weight a maker will certify for one specific build of one specific truck. It is not a number that belongs to a model name. Change the cab, the box, the axle ratio, the drivetrain, or the engine, and the rating changes with it.

The test procedure named by two of the four brands here is SAE International's J2807, “Performance Requirements for Determining Tow-Vehicle Gross Combination Weight Rating and Trailer Weight Rating.”

Whether your truck falls inside that 14,000 lbs ceiling depends on the GVWR of the build in front of you. Ram publishes a 14,000 lbs GVWR for its highest-rated 3500, exactly at the scope limit. Chevrolet publishes an 11,500 lbs GVWR for a Silverado 2500 HD Crew Cab Standard Bed, comfortably inside it.

What the procedure puts a truck through is set out by Equipment World's Bruce Smith, in an article first published in June 2014 and updated in September 2026. SAE's public abstract carries the scope paragraph and not the test detail, so everything in the next two lists is Smith's summary rather than SAE's wording.

What J2807 tests:

• Cooling on a long highway upgrade modeled on the Davis Dam grade on Arizona SR 68
• Launch and acceleration on a level road and on a 12 percent upgrade
• Combined handling, including understeer and trailer sway
• Combined braking, covering stopping distance and parking brake hold on a grade
• Structural performance for the vehicle and the hitch or hitch receiver

What J2807 assumes when it calculates the rating:

• A driver and a passenger, each weighing 150 pounds
• Any options with higher than 33 percent penetration
• Up to 70 pounds of aftermarket hitch equipment
• For conventional towing, 10 percent of the trailer weight on the tongue

That last assumption could not be confirmed at SAE, at any maker, or at NHTSA, so it belongs to Equipment World rather than to the standard.

Which makers say they follow it

No federal rule requires a maker to use J2807, and none is obliged to say whether it did. The four brands split evenly on whether they say so, which is worth knowing before you compare their numbers against each other.

Chevrolet and GMC both say instead that “Maximum trailering ratings are intended for comparison purposes only.” Neither says it does not follow the procedure, only that it does not claim to.

A hitch maker's testing is a separate question, and a quality certification is not a load test. Mike Slabaugh, the GEN-Y HITCH expert, describes how GEN-Y approaches it: “GEN-Y tests its hitches based on what market they're being sold to which then dictates what testing standards are used (SAE, ADR, etc.). In some cases multiple standards apply which means we test to all applicable. ISO doesn't dictate the actual testing but it does have some documentation requirements for prints and product release reports.” The company that makes GEN-Y HITCH products, Nexgen Group, Inc., holds ISO 9001:2015 certification from Verisys Registrars (certificate N121825, effective December 19, 2025, valid to December 18, 2028) for the design, manufacture, assembly, and distribution of vehicle hitch systems and ramps. On Slabaugh's account, that certification governs documentation rather than the load test itself.

2026 heavy-duty tow ratings compared

Every figure below came off the maker's own 2026 chart or towing guide, all retrieved on 26 October 2026. Each rating gets its own row, because a truck's conventional, gooseneck, and fifth wheel maxima are frequently earned by three different builds. Reading across a single model name will mislead you.

Single rear wheel trucks

Dual rear wheel trucks

Four things in those tables that are easy to misread

Ram's headline figure is not a conventional rating. The Ram 3500's 36,610 lbs covers gooseneck and fifth wheel towing, published as one combined number. Ram separately requires a gooseneck or fifth wheel hitch above 23,000 lbs on the 3500 and 20,000 lbs on the 2500, so conventional towing stops well short of the headline.

The two GM 2500 HD figures are not directly comparable. Chevrolet's 22,050 lbs is a Regular Cab Long Bed 4x4; GMC's 22,390 lbs is a Regular Cab Long Bed 2WD. The trucks are mechanical twins, so the gap reflects the configurations each chart chose to publish.

The heaviest gooseneck and fifth wheel ratings run above the SAE standard's scope. SAE J2638 reaches 30,000 lbs gross trailer weight. Ford's 40,000 lbs, the GM 36,000 lbs, and Ram's 36,610 lbs all sit above that ceiling.

A rating and a payload are different ceilings. Tongue weight and pin weight come out of payload, along with passengers and anything in the bed.

Ford publishes maximum payload by engine rather than by model, up to 6,952 lbs with the 6.7L Power Stroke diesel and 6,935 lbs with the 6.7L High Output Power Stroke diesel, and the figure varies with configuration.

Matching a hitch to your trailer

Two numbers govern the connection, and whichever you reach first is the one that stops you.

Mike Slabaugh states the governing rule: “The max tow rating is always limited to the lowest rated component and receiver size will dictate which hitch shank size you need.”

The sources that tell you what tongue weight should be do not agree, and the disagreement is worth seeing rather than averaging away.

Chevrolet and GMC are both General Motors and word it differently from each other: one calls 10% a maximum, the other calls 10 to 15 percent roughly right. The “15% to 25%” gooseneck range that circulates widely is not any of these figures.

Maker-published tongue weight limits in pounds are rarer than the percentages. Ford publishes the clearest table of the four.

Ford also publishes its receiver sizes, which no other brand here does:

• A 2.5" receiver is standard on all models
• A 3" receiver on the F-350 DRW Crew Cab with the 6.7L H.O. diesel and 4.10 final drive ratio
• A 3" receiver on the F-450 Crew Cab with the 6.7L H.O. diesel
• Ford's receivers “do not include a hitch ball or ball mounting”

What the other three publish is thinner. Ram gives Class V receiver maximum tongue weight limits of 2,000 lbs on the 2500 and 2,300 lbs on the 3500, without stating the opening size. Chevrolet and GMC publish no numeric tongue weight figure for their heavy-duty trucks at all, only the percentage rules above. Measure your receiver opening before ordering a shank.

Sizing a GEN-Y hitch to the receiver

Receiver size decides shank size, and shank size narrows the product list before any rating does.

Ratings retrieved from the live GEN-Y HITCH product pages on 26 October 2026, and due for a re-check on the publish date.

How to size the hitch, in order:

1. Weigh the loaded trailer. Use a scale, not the brochure dry weight.
2. Work out the tongue weight at the percentage your truck maker publishes, 10% conventional or 15% gooseneck and fifth wheel for Ford and Chevrolet.
3. Measure the receiver opening, since only Ford publishes it.
4. Check your truck's rating for that hitch type, not its headline number, using the tables above.
5. Pick a hitch rated above both your trailer weight and your tongue weight, with a shank that matches the receiver.
6. Check the pin. It carries its own rating, and on GEN-Y's 32K hitches it changes the rating outright.

Three notes on the product table:

• The BOSS pages list a “smoothest ride achieved at” window, which is not a rating. In GEN-Y's wording, the BOSS 21K “is rated to tow up to 21,000 pounds with a 2,400 pound tongue weight, and owners get the smoothest ride within a 1,500 to 2,400 pound tongue weight range.” The first pair are limits; the second are a comfort band inside them.
• The pin changes the rating. GEN-Y states that “32K weight capacity hitches are derated to 21K weight capacity when using the 5/8" pinhole,” and that “A 3/4" pin is needed to secure the hitch in the truck receiver for the full 32K lb. rating.” A 32,000 lbs hitch on a 5/8" pin is a 21,000 lbs hitch.
• Receiver and shank do not always match. Where they differ, reducer sleeves adapt a 2.5" or 3" receiver down. GEN-Y notes that 3" receivers “are only offered on select FORD vehicles manufactured after 2017,” which matches Ford's own receiver note.

GEN-Y HITCH states that customers report up to 90% smoother towing with Torsion-Flex, its patented rubber torsion arm technology, which cushions the connection between truck and trailer. That is a customer-reported impression as published by GEN-Y, not a measured test result.

For the arithmetic behind step two, see our guide on how to calculate safe towing capacity step by step.

Ratings by hitch type

Each hitch type is rated on its own basis, and the SAE standards covering them stop below the ratings the makers publish.

Bumper pull

SAE J684, “Trailer Couplings, Hitches, and Safety Chains, Automotive Type,” covers ball-and-socket connections. It was first issued in February 1962 and last revised on 30 May 2014. The scope wording, read on SAE's 2004 reaffirmation page rather than on the 2014 revision, covers trailers “whose Gross Vehicle Weight Rating (GVWR) does not exceed 4540 kg (10 000 lb),” and says the document is intended “primarily for ball-and-socket type of couplings and hitches.”

That 10,000 lbs ceiling leaves a gap. No SAE standard was identified covering conventional receiver hitches above it, and the familiar Class I to Class V system could not be traced to J684 or to any other SAE document. For how the classes are commonly defined, and why the figures vary between manufacturers, see trailer hitch classes explained.

Ram sets its own ceiling regardless of standard, requiring a gooseneck or fifth wheel hitch above 20,000 lbs on the 2500 and above 23,000 lbs on the 3500. GEN-Y's range of bumper pull hitches covers the receiver sizes above.

Gooseneck

SAE J2638 covers gooseneck attachment performance. It was first issued in October 2003, last revised on 28 November 2017, and its scope runs to trailers “at or below 13608 kg (30000 pounds) gross trailer weight,” setting criteria for “the hitch, tow vehicle attachment structure, trailer attachment structure, and coupler.”

The ceiling problem appears here one step higher. Ford's 40,000 lbs, the GM 36,000 lbs, and Ram's 36,610 lbs all exceed 30,000 lbs. The lighter gooseneck ratings sit inside the scope, including Ford's 23,000 lbs on the F-250 SRW and the GM and Ram 2500 figures, as do GEN-Y's couplers.

GEN-Y describes the VIKING as static, without the torsion suspension used in its Torsion-Flex gooseneck couplers. Ram publishes a gooseneck hitch weight of 40 lbs and a conventional hitch weight of 75 lbs, both of which come out of payload.

Fifth wheel

J2638 is the same standard for fifth wheel attachment, which SAE names alongside gooseneck in one scope statement rather than splitting them, so the same 30,000 lbs ceiling applies. The hitch types remain different hardware with different ratings.

GEN-Y's fifth wheel Torsion-Flex pin boxes are rated by trailer GVWR band rather than by a single towing figure. The EXECUTIVE Fifth Wheel Torsion-Flex King Pin Box is published in three:

GEN-Y prints two cautions on that page that apply to every hitch in this article: “Tow capacity is limited by lowest rated component,” and “It is important to be within the optimal Tongue/Pin weight specified for each model number!”

Ram publishes a fifth wheel hitch weight of 250 lbs, which comes straight off payload.

What happens when you exceed a rating

The clearest statement of the consequence comes from a truck maker rather than a hitch maker. Nissan's 2023 Frontier owner's manual states the part most owners miss: “Your vehicle may be capable of towing a trailer heavier than the weight rating of the hitch components.” The Frontier is a midsize truck, but the principle is not size-specific and no heavy-duty manual was found putting it as plainly.

Three limits on how far that table reaches:

• No maker document was found saying that overloading voids a warranty. Anyone repeating that as a sourced fact is going beyond what the makers publish.
• The NHTSA interpretation is more than 50 years old, and no more recent agency statement on the point was found, so treat it as the position as recorded then.
• The CHP thresholds are California's and cover private towing. The bulletin adds that “for the purpose of determining DL requirements, either the GVWR or the GVW, whichever is greater, will be used,” so loading below a rating does not move you into a lower class. Towing for business brings commercial licensing rules it does not address.

Scale is harder to pin down than it should be. NHTSA publishes no citable trailer-towing crash statistic, and the figure most often attributed to it does not come from there: in a June 2025 release from Representative Rudy Yakym's office supporting National Trailer Safety Week, Representative John Garamendi is quoted saying that “every year, 50,000 trailer accidents injure 21,000 Americans and kill hundreds.” That is a statement to Congress, not an agency dataset.

For the practical version of this, see what happens when you exceed your tow rating.

Not sure which hitch fits your truck and trailer? Find your nearest stockist through the GEN-Y HITCH dealer finder, or call (574) 218-6363.

Sources

1. SAE International, J2807, Performance Requirements for Determining Tow-Vehicle Gross Combination Weight Rating and Trailer Weight Rating, revision J2807_202411
2. SAE International, J2807_201205 (2012 revision, 13,000 lbs scope)
3. SAE International, J684, Trailer Couplings, Hitches, and Safety Chains, Automotive Type, revision J684_201405, scope text read on the 2004 reaffirmation page
4. SAE International, J2638, Fifth Wheel and Gooseneck Attachment Performance Up to 13608 kg (30000 lb) Trailer Weight, revision J2638_201711
5. Bruce Smith, Tow ratings: SAE J2807 overview, Equipment World, published 23 June 2014, updated 23 September 2026
6. Ford Motor Company, 2026 Ford Super Duty Pickup Towing Guide
7. Ford Motor Company, 2025 Ford RV and Trailer Towing Guide, revised 10 January 2025
8. Chevrolet, 2026 Silverado 3500 HD trailering chart
9. Chevrolet, 2026 Chevrolet Trailering Guide
10. GMC, 2026 GMC Sierra 3500 trailering charts
11. GMC, 2026 GMC Sierra 2500 trailering charts
12. GMC, What is tongue weight? GMC Life
13. Ram Trucks, MY26 Ram HD Customer Tow/Pay Chart
14. Nissan, 2023 Nissan Frontier Owner's Manual, Towing Safety
15. NHTSA, Office of the Chief Counsel, interpretation nht75-5.10, Richard B. Dyson, 30 May 1975
16. California Highway Patrol, California Driver License Requirements for Towing Trailers, 10 July 2020
17. North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality, Division of Marine Fisheries, Safe trailering and towing, undated
18. Office of Representative Rudy Yakym, Rep. Yakym introduces bipartisan resolution in support of National Trailer Safety Week, 4 June 2025
19. GEN-Y HITCH product and collection pages, retrieved 26 October 2026: MEGA-DUTY drop hitches, BOSS Torsion-Flex drop hitches, bumper pull hitches, gooseneck Torsion-Flex couplers, fifth wheel Torsion-Flex pin boxes, Torsion-Flex technology, and OEM capabilities