Toyota USA posted a cryptic video to its Facebook page this morning that confirms a recent rumor bubbling through the automotive press.
The video scrolls through five historical Toyota Land Cruiser badges over the caption, “Did you really think we’d be gone for long? The legend returns.”
The Land Cruiser is an iconic full-size off-roader built under that name since the 1950s (and purists trace its lineage back further to a series of Japanese army trucks built before World War II). Toyota has sold the Cruiser on almost every continent. Just a handful of automotive nameplates have survived nearly 70 years, but the Land Cruiser can make that claim.
Toyota canceled its iconic big off-roader, at least in the U.S., back in 2020. However, the rest of the world still gets two models under the name.
We can’t be sure which of the two we’re getting yet. But the video seems to confirm that one or the other will soon bring the iconic name back to American roads.
Two Options: Full Size and Almost Full-Size
In some markets, Toyota still sells a full-size Land Cruiser. Called the J300 series internally, it’s a big body-on-frame SUV similar in size to the Toyota Sequoia but built with more of an off-road focus. American buyers can arguably still get it. It shares most of its mechanical parts with the Lexus LX. But the LX’s $92,160 starting price, which includes the destination fee, puts it out of reach of many.
The company also builds a slightly smaller 3-row SUV called the Land Cruiser Prado in Asia. Its badge just reads “Land Cruiser” in Europe. Until recently, the Prado shared most of its parts with the Lexus GX. But the GX got a thorough redesign with a boxy new aesthetic, unveiled just last week.
Now, Automotive News reports, the Land Cruiser Prado is headed for a similar redesign. When it arrives, “Toyota may simply drop Prado from the name and badge it a Land Cruiser” for the U.S. market.
Toyota’s public relations team likes to tease out details about new models slowly over long stretches. So we expect to learn more, bit by tedious bit, before a final reveal later this year.
