If you just picked up a 2024+ F-150 with the 5.0L Coyote V8, congratulations. You bought one of the last great naturally aspirated truck motors Ford still sells, and it deserves to be heard. The factory exhaust does that motor zero favors, though, which is exactly why you landed here trying to figure out which Borla to bolt on. Touring? S-Type? ATAK? They all fit your truck, they all sound great in their own way, and picking the wrong one for your daily routine is an easy way to end up annoyed every morning on the way to work.
I'll save you the guesswork. I daily a 2024 F-150 STX with the 5.0, and I run the Borla S-Type on it. I installed it myself in my own driveway, so this isn't a spec sheet I'm reading back to you. It's three years of Borla's lineup boiled down to what actually matters when you're standing in the driveway deciding how loud you want to live. Let's break down all three, talk honestly about the cylinder-deactivation quirk on these new trucks, and get you into the right system. As always, if you've got questions after reading this, reach out. We're always happy to help you sort it out.
First, what all three have in common
Before we split hairs on volume, understand that with Borla you're not trading quality for sound level. Touring, S-Type, and ATAK are all built from the same premium T-304 stainless steel, they're all backed by Borla's Million Mile Warranty, and on the 5.0L F-150 they're all engine-specific cat-back systems. That means they replace everything from the cat-back to the tips while leaving your catalytic converters and emissions hardware factory and untouched. You choose your exit style (split rear exit or dual side exit) and your tip finish (chrome or black chrome) regardless of which sound level you pick.
So the decision really comes down to one thing: how aggressive do you want it to be? Touring is the mildest, S-Type sits in the middle, and ATAK is the loudest and meanest of the three. Every other consideration, whether that's drone, cold-start volume, or how it behaves on the highway, flows out of that one choice. Borla designs all three to be drone-free by intent, but "drone-free" means different things at different volume levels, and the 2024+ trucks throw one extra variable into the mix that I'll get to in a minute.
Borla Touring: the quiet professional
The Touring is the system for the guy who wants the truck to sound noticeably better than stock without ever calling attention to itself. On a cold start it actually isn't far off the louder systems, and you'll get a nice bark when you fire it up in the morning. But the moment you're rolling, it settles way down. Cruising at highway speed, the Touring is genuinely quiet. You can hold a phone call, your passenger isn't raising their voice, and if you baby the throttle most people behind you won't even know it's there. Roll into it, though, and the V8 wakes up just enough to remind you what's under the hood.
I'd point you at the Touring if any of these are true: you do a long highway commute every day, you tow or road-trip regularly and don't want exhaust fatigue setting in after hour three, your truck doubles as the family hauler, or you live somewhere with neighbors and HOA types who notice that kind of thing. It's also the best of the three at hiding the cylinder-deactivation sound, which matters on the 2024+ trucks specifically and which I'll explain shortly. The Touring is the "mature" choice, and there's zero shame in it. Plenty of guys who've owned loud trucks before come back to a Touring on purpose.
Borla S-Type: the one I actually run
This is my system, so I'll give you the unfiltered version. The S-Type is the middle child. It's louder and meatier than the Touring but a clear step below the ATAK, and for a daily-driven 5.0 I think it's the sweet spot. Borla uses a straight-through muffler design on the S-Type that's specifically tuned to cancel the high-frequency junk that causes interior drone and rasp, and in my truck that tuning is the whole story. The sound scales with RPM in a way that just feels right.
Here's exactly what mine does. Cold start is fantastic. You get a deep, healthy bark when it first lights off that genuinely sounds like a V8 should, and it never fails to make me happy walking out to it in the morning. It's a little raucous for those first few minutes while everything's cold, and then it calms right down at idle once it warms up, settling into a mellow, contented burble you can sit at a drive-thru with. But the part that sold me, and the part I'd buy it for again tomorrow, is what happens when you rev it or get into the higher RPMs: it sounds amazing. The S-Type absolutely wakes up the Coyote up top. That motor loves to spin, and the exhaust finally lets you hear it doing its thing. Around town and on the highway it's well-behaved enough that I've never once been annoyed by it, and that's the test that matters for a truck you drive every single day.
If you want presence and personality without committing to "everyone in the parking lot is looking at you" volume, the S-Type is where I'd steer you. It's the system I put my own money and my own afternoon into, and I'd do it again without hesitation.
Borla ATAK: maximum attitude
ATAK stands for Acoustically-Tuned Aggressive Kit, and Borla isn't being modest with the name. This is the loudest, most aggressive system of the three, built around a race-inspired multi-core muffler that produces a deep, intense tone across the entire RPM range. Cold starts are an event. Wide-open throttle is genuinely loud. And the biggest difference between the ATAK and the other two shows up while you're just cruising, where the ATAK is noticeably louder at a steady highway speed and the Touring and even the S-Type back off.
That's the trade. The ATAK delivers the most sound and the most character, and if your F-150 is a weekend toy, a show truck, or you simply want the most aggressive thing Borla offers and you don't care who hears it, this is your system. But go in honest with yourself about your daily routine. If you've got a long quiet commute, the ATAK can wear on you over time, and on the 2024+ trucks it's the system that makes the cylinder-deactivation behavior the most obvious. The ATAK is the most fun and the least apologetic. Just make sure that's actually what you want every day, not just on the test drive.
The 2024+ wrinkle nobody warns you about: cylinder deactivation
Here's the one thing I really want you to understand before you buy anything, because it's specific to these newer trucks and it surprises a lot of people. The 2024+ 5.0 uses cylinder deactivation. Under light load, like easy cruising or coasting, the truck shuts down half the cylinders to save fuel and runs as a four-cylinder until you ask for power again. On the stock exhaust you'd barely notice. With any aftermarket cat-back, you absolutely will.
I'll be straight with you: when that deactivation kicks in, it sounds pretty horrible. The note goes flat and off-balance and droney for those moments it's running on four cylinders, and then it snaps back to that good V8 sound the instant the other cylinders come back online. This isn't a Borla problem and it isn't a defect. It's just the reality of putting a freer-flowing exhaust on a 2024+ 5.0, and you'd hear the same thing with any brand. There is no aftermarket cat-back that completely hides it.
What you can control is how loud that ugly moment gets, and that comes back to which system you choose. The Touring limits how noticeable the deactivation sound is because it's the quietest of the three to begin with. Step up to the S-Type and you'll hear it a bit more, and step up to the ATAK and the more aggressive tuning makes it the most noticeable of all. So if the deactivation sound is something you think will bug you, that's a real point in the Touring's favor.
The good news is you've got ways to deal with it no matter which system you run. The simplest, free fix is to drop the truck into Sport mode or Tow/Haul mode. Both of those keep all eight cylinders firing, so the deactivation never engages and the truck just sounds good all the time. A lot of us basically live in Sport mode for exactly this reason. And if you want it gone for good, there are now tunes coming out for the 2024+ 5.0 (companies like Livernois and HP Tuners-based options through OZ Tuning, among others) that can switch off cylinder deactivation completely, usually alongside killing auto stop/start and cleaning up the transmission behavior. So between a button you already have and a tune if you want to go further, this is a very manageable quirk. You just want to know about it going in rather than discovering it on the drive home.
How hard is the install?
Easier than you're probably afraid it is. The Borla cat-back on the F-150 is a true bolt-on system. It's designed to use the factory hanger locations and clamp up to the existing setup, with no welding, no cutting, and no fabrication. I installed mine myself, in my driveway, with normal hand tools. If you're reasonably comfortable under a truck and you've got a way to get it up in the air safely, it's a very doable afternoon project.
That said, I'll give you the same honest tip I give everyone: grab a buddy. Maneuvering the piping into position and holding things up while you start the clamps is the kind of thing that's mildly annoying solo and genuinely easy with a second set of hands. You can absolutely do it alone, since I did, but a friend turns it from a workout into a quick job, and it makes lining up the tips for a clean, even look at the bumper a lot less fiddly. Take your time getting the alignment right before you torque everything down and you'll end up with a setup that looks factory-clean and doesn't rattle.
So which one should you buy?
Let me make it simple. Buy the Touring if you prioritize a quiet, comfortable cabin, you do long highway miles or tow often, or you specifically want to keep that 2024+ cylinder-deactivation sound as muted as possible. Buy the S-Type, which is my pick and what's bolted to my own STX, if you want a real, satisfying V8 presence with a killer cold start and an incredible top end but you still want a truck that's easy to live with every single day. Buy the ATAK if you want the loudest, most aggressive sound Borla makes and your truck is more about fun than commuting, and you're at peace with hearing the deactivation moment and the highway drone that come along with that volume.
There's no wrong answer here. All three are top-tier systems backed by a million-mile warranty, so there's only the right answer for you. If you can swing it, listening to sound clips of all three on a 5.0 before you commit is always worth the time, since this stuff is genuinely subjective and what reads as "perfect" to me might be a touch quiet or a touch loud for you.
Ready to wake up your Coyote?
We stock the full Borla lineup (Touring, S-Type, and ATAK) for the 2024+ F-150 5.0 here at Wild 5 Performance, in both split rear and dual side-exit configurations with chrome and black chrome tip options. If you tell us how you drive your truck and what you're after, we'll help you land on the exact system and configuration that fits your build. Reach out anytime with questions, whether it's sound, fitment, install, or sorting out that cylinder-deactivation tune — we're always happy to help. Now go give that 5.0 the voice it's been missing.
