The next-generation Toyota RAV4 may have been spied for the first time.
A single image reshared by Coche Spias – which appears to have been taken in the US – shows a camouflaged vehicle wearing design cues from both the current RAV4 as well as newer Toyota models.
That suggests we could be looking at the upcoming sixth-generation Toyota RAV4, expected to debut sometime in 2025.
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Credit: Coche Spias
There appears to be the same ‘Hammer Head’ front styling of Toyotas like the latest Camry and Prius, while the belt line appears to have been tweaked.
However, the angular wheel arches and the creasing at the bottom of the doors closely resemble those of the existing RAV4.
It’s possible, then, that the new RAV4 will retain its hard points and even sheetmetal with the outgoing one – much as the latest Camry has – while gaining the brand’s latest technology.
While we can’t see inside the car, a pair of 12.3-inch screens – one for the infotainment system, the other for the digital instrument cluster – may feature, as they do in the Camry.
While the new Camry doesn’t look vastly different externally, it received a significantly different dashboard design with its latest generation.
Current RAV4
Toyota has confirmed it isn’t looking to rock the boat with its new RAV4, though.
“RAV4 is easy,” Toyota Motor North America product planning head Cooper Ericksen told Automotive News in July.
“We have other product segments that are difficult, but the customer has spoken clearly with what they want with the RAV4: The size, the packaging, the level of performance, technology.
“We could sell 500,000 of those things a year if we could build them, so we do not want to mess up that formula.”
The company said the RAV4 had turned into its Camry over the last 10 years in terms of total sales.
The RAV4 is expected to use the current model’s TNGA-K underpinnings, though it could follow the latest Camry in adopting Toyota’s new-generation hybrid technology.
In the latest Camry, the new hybrid system features a lighter and more compact transaxle than before, as well as a more powerful electric motor.
Total system power for the 2.5-litre hybrid four-cylinder powertrain was increased by 10kW to 170kW, with Toyota claiming an 11 per cent reduction in fuel consumption plus improvements in both performance and noise suppression.
The RAV4 is a crucial vehicle for Toyota.
Last year, it was Toyota’s best-selling vehicle in the US, and JATO Dynamics data said that combined with the Wildlander – a lightly restyled version for the Chinese market – it was the world’s second-best selling vehicle behind only the Tesla Model Y.
This year, it has overtaken the HiLux in Australia and could be the brand’s best seller – if not the market’s overall – in 2024.
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