Future Vehicles

The 2025 Volkswagen Jetta and Jetta GLI are refreshed, getting slightly updated styling, new available colors, and a lower pre-fees MSRP.

As far as saving the manuals goes, VW is taking one stick-shift away and leaving one available.

Despite an exodous by other makes, Volkswagen is sticking with the compact sedan segment – at least for the foreseeable future. Iterations of the 2025 Jetta and Jetta GLI will be unveiled early next week.

Volkswagen fans will be pleased to learn the German brand’s lineup for the 2025 model year will apparently be the freshest array of machines it’s had on sale in some spell.

Volkswagen has been teasing the Golf GTI Clubsport all month ahead of the planned reveal during Nürburgring 24 Hours. The endurance race will serve as the premiere of what’s likely to become the most powerful GTI VW has ever fielded. The bad news is that North America isn’t supposed to receive this particular vehicle. But the good news is that some of its equipment is likely to migrate over to the standard GTI that’s still sold in the United States for the 2025 model year.

General Motors president Mark Reuss threw some shade at the all-electric Ford “Mustang” Mach-E by suggesting an electrified Chevrolet Camaro would not go the crossover route if he had his druthers. However, he still said such a vehicle would ideally seek to broaden the model’s appeal beyond the hardcore enthusiast base. In related news, Ford CEO Jim Farley recently hinted that there’s a Mustang sedan under consideration — noting that the nameplate would hopefully play host to a V8 powertrain for as long as possible.

If it weren’t for teaser shots about hotly anticipated models from different brands, car corners of the internet wouldn’t have much to talk about on some days. Fortunately, the news keeps rolling from Toyota, who’ve released a telling photo of the upcoming 4Runner – along with a suggested release date.

In a California two-fer, electric vehicle manufacturer Rivian rolled out a pair of new EVs today, both of which have deep familial resemblances and a host of appeal to overlanders.

Despite having been quoted as confirming the BMW M5 Touring for North America, Domagoj Dukec has just recanted. Earlier statements from the brand’s design head stipulating that our market would have access to both the sedan and wagon versions of the M5 have been taken back — leaving everyone following the story more than a little perplexed.

I'll admit, I struggled for a headline for this one. Press releases are, across the board, buzzword-heavy, and that's never more true than when it comes to concept cars.

It makes sense -- concept cars have less in the way of concrete specs to discuss than production cars do. And it certainly applies to the Chrysler Halcyon Concept.

Earlier this week, Matt wrote about Dodge's take on how American muscle will evolve as cars become more electrified.

We saw a teaser image of the Toyota Tacoma last week, and now there are two more images -- one of which teases the release date.

Hyundai Motor Group – which includes Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis – has announced a comprehensive plan for its products from 2025 onward with the key components being perpetual connectivity, subscriptions, and software-defined automobiles. It sounds benign but actually represents a major shift in the way the company operates by calling for widespread platform standardization and leaning into novel revenue streams reliant on vehicles existing on its corporate network.

Following Citroën’s preview of its new logo, there was a healthy buzz around the foreshadowed concept model that would first wear the badge. As French automakers are known for going against the grain, occasionally resulting in some brilliant innovation, there was a level of genuine excitement that the brand would deliver something truly novel during a period where the industry seemed to be running out of ideas. 

The resulting vehicle turned out to be extremely innovative. However, it wasn’t quite the morale booster some of us had anticipated, because the concept isn’t designed for today’s world. Instead, Citroën delivered a vehicle that’s designed for a future existence where resources are unavailable and people have to make do with less of everything. Though that doesn’t mean some of the concepts included in the design aren’t absolutely brilliant.

General Motors has filed for four trademarks with the United States Patent and Trademark office.

The trademarks are believed to be related to trim-level names for the upcoming Cadillac Celestiq EV.

It appears that Tim “The Toolman” Taylor has a product-planning position at Cadillac.

That’s because, apparently, someone decided that just what the Escalade needed was “more power.”

A lot more power.

Lincoln is promising three new fully-electric vehicles by 2025. Ford’s luxury arm took the wraps off of a concept previewing one of them last night.

The 2022 New York Auto Show isn’t the first major auto show to be held since COVID-19 shut the world down in March 2020 – Chicago had shows in 2021 and 2022, and Los Angeles was in its usual slot last year. And there was Motorbella in Detroit last summer.

Still, for whatever reason – the loosening of COVID restrictions, the fact it was the first New York show since COVID, the presence of NY-based journos who don’t deign to travel west of the Hudson for those other shows – there was a pre-show feeling that this was it. This would be the show that marked the return of normalcy. Not LA in 2021 or Chicago just a couple of months ago – no, it would be this one.

Hyundai’s Palisade separates itself from Kia’s Telluride, at least in terms of appearance, by being the more “urban”, stylistically speaking, of the two.

The former looks boxy and rugged, while the latter has curves that evoke urban luxury — at least to this author’s eye.*

The Kia Telluride looks more rugged and tough than it is. Well, Kia is changing that with updates for 2023.

Let’s say you run a car company that just launched a large SUV last year. Let’s say you feel, for whatever reason, that it needs more length.

What do you do? Well, you extend it, of course.

Another day, another teaser. Thankfully, this will all be over by tomorrow’s happy hour.

This time, it’s Chrysler. Which is showing the Airflow Concept.

Many a debut has been made in New York over the years. Add the 2023 Kia Niro to the list.

It’s “all-new” in Kia-speak, though at this juncture we don’t know if it’s a redesign or a refresh. We’re guessing the former, based on the marketing speak.

Like its platform-mate, the Kia Telluride, the Hyundai Palisade is going under the knife, with the results planned for show at the 2022 New York Auto Show on Wednesday.

It seems like just yesterday that Kia unveiled the Telluride three-row SUV. Now it’s apparently due for its first significant refresh.

As if the 2023 Honda HR-V hasn’t been teased enough. The wraps are finally off, yet we still know little about the mechanicals.

We reported on the leak of the Toyota GR Corolla yesterday, and as expected, the specs we reported on matched up.

Launching a new vehicle under embargo must be a stressful endeavor for all those who are involved on the OEM side.

Take the Toyota GR Corolla. The brand has been so careful to build up interest via teases, and has plans to take the wraps off tonight — and it all got spoiled by some careless management of the company’s consumer Web site.

A Lotus EV? If British electronics are involved, isn’t a Lotus EV going to be useful only as a paperweight?

I kid, I kid. Lotus, however, is dead serious — the Lotus Eletre is here, and the company calls it “the world’s first electric Hyper-SUV”.

Mark your calendars for three days from now, folks.

Not only is it payday for a lot of us working schlubs, but Carscoops reports it’s also the day we’ll see the Toyota GR Corolla — and that the car is slated for our shores.

There has been much speculation over the past week regarding General Motors’ trademark application for a new Buick logo. Likely related to a swath of new EVs on the horizon (but not yet confirmed), the news fired up the old Abandoned History thought box. Why not take a look at all of Buick’s past logos? We began yesterday in 1903, and pick up today in 1942.

According to a recently filed trademark application, Buick’s familiar tri-shield logo may be going the way of the dodo. It’s been suggested the potential logo change is in pursuit of a revised image, in preparation for the Brave New World of EVs that Buick will soon unleash upon millions of eager customers. However, given the company has been around for over 120 years this is far from the first time Buick has swapped its badge.

We’ve been hearing a lot about the 2023 Acura Integra all year, and now the wraps are off, officially.

The entry-level luxury/sport hatch will, as rumored, offer a manual transmission, though it won’t have all-wheel drive.

Not to be outdone by corporate siblings Hyundai and Genesis, which have announced plans to launch 17 electric, or at least electrified, vehicles combined by 2030, Kia has claimed it will have 14 EVs (or, again, vehicles that at least have some electrification) by 2027.

Including two pickup trucks.

A Nissan dealership employee shared what appears to be a presentation slide of the upcoming Z’s launch timing.

If true, it confirms that the car will go on sale in June.

The upcoming Acura Integra is slated to be available with the company’s Super Handling All-Wheel Drive (SH-AWD), according to a report circulating on one of the forums managed by our corporate parents.

Carscoops is reporting that following spy shots that suggested the Porsche Panamera is in line for a facelift, new snaps might indicate that a full redesign is on the way.

The teaser game continues.

Honda has sent the automotive press two teaser images of the next-generation HR-V small crossover.

At the dawn of automobiles, there were tremendously more brands from which to choose in America than there are today. With the rapid transition to all things electric, new companies are sprouting up faster than dandelions on your author’s lawn. Rivian, Lucid, Tesla – actually, when Tesla is the newest company in a particular group of examples, you know the landscape is changing rapidly.

Next out of the gate? A company from Vietnam called VinFast. Last night at CES, they hauled the covers off five different EVs, all of them shaped like crossovers ranging in size from S to XXL.

Rivian may be experiencing more production delays. Maybe this is why it now apparently has a delivery-time estimator on its build site?

Rivian is planning on adding a feature to its online configurator that estimates the time of delivery of the customer’s vehicle.

It’s mild news, to be sure, but it’s the week of Thanksgiving.

We’ve already covered the Subaru Solterra EV, so I don’t have much to add.

Instead, you can enjoy two poorly-lit pics from the 2021 Los Angeles Auto Show.

The Los Angeles Auto Show is this week — yes, it’s actually happening, as of this writing, and this author is boarding a flight for Cali tomorrow — and one of the vehicles that had been teased in advance of the show was the Mazda CX-50.

Audi recently announced a new, super luxurious version of its largest sedan, and it’ll wear some branding not seen in a very long time. Wake up Horch, it’s 2022.

Kia’s current tagline is “movement that inspires” and while I am not sure if the 2023 Kia Sportage will be inspiring, exactly, it will catch your attention.

The 2023 Chevrolet Corvette Z06 is here.

And on paper, it appears to be bad-ass in ways worthy of the Z06 designation.

Ford and General Motors are both slated to show their third-quarter earnings reports on Thursday.

Reports suggest that despite the negative impacts of the global semiconductor chip shortage, there may be positives for the companies, as well.

The same forum that told us to anticipate the order bank opening for the 2022 Ford Lightning next week is now saying “not so fast, my friend” (apologies to Lee Corso).

A VIN decoder appears to have revealed the names of Rivian’s planned vans.

A report from one of our corporate parent’s forums suggests that orders for the Ford Lightning may open up next week, on October 26.

That’s based on a message left to a forum user by a Ford salesperson.

An order guide for the 2022 Ford Bronco confirms that the Sasquatch off-road package will be available with a manual transmission.

Ford had already indicated it would listen to consumer demand and give three-pedal fans the option of rowing their own, but now it’s official.

We’ve written about the lofty promises automakers are making when it comes to EVs, but regardless of whether you think they’ll make their targets or not, they’re at least putting plans in motion.

Ford has its Blue Oval City. Meanwhile, General Motors has plans to open a battery-cell lab in suburban Detroit.

Earlier this year, we introduced you to the Jeep Grand Cherokee L. Jeep promised that the five-seat Grand Cherokee sharing the L’s new platform was soon to come.

And now it’s here. Imagine that. Funny how that works.

If you were hoping the returning Acura Integra would be the peppy, three-door liftback everyone coveted 20 years ago, we may have some bad news for you. Based on the latest teasers coming from the Honda Motor Company, the fifth-generation model will likely harken back to the five-door vehicles that rarely saw themselves equipped with aftermarket body kits or cold-air intakes and barely received any screen time in the Fast & Furious films.

Rather than focus on the cars of the 1990s ( arguably the high-water mark for the Integra), Honda has decided to base the new model on the first-generation and even included a photo of the 1986 Acura Integra RS 5-Door in the latest marketing materials to drive the point home.

Chevrolet’s Corvette Z06 will be revealed in full on October 26. In advance of that, the brand has put out the first official image.

This follows a teaser video from July.

It’s become something of a mantra for me, lately, but that doesn’t make it any less true. It goes like this: Electric cars aren’t coming, they’re already here. And, depending on who you ask, they’ve been here – they just haven’t quite made it into the mainstream, yet. With the dawn of the Rivian R1T ( which became the first full-size electric pickup to reach series production earlier this month), though, a lot of people would have you believe that’s set to change. I happen to be one of them.

The North American International Auto Show, aka Detroit Auto Show, can’t catch a break.

Organizers decided to move the show to summer and the outdoors for 2020, and boom, COVID comes along and cancels it. They rebrand, move it to late summer and outdoors — at a different site — and boom, Mother Nature decides to assert herself with a day and a half of deluge. So much water fell from the sky that the second day was canceled.

The full-size truck race is competitive, and one can’t afford to fall too far behind.

After a few years of hearing criticisms concerning the Silverado, and how it’s not as stylish as the Ram 1500 or well-done as the Ford F-150, Chevrolet has unveiled an updated truck, with the intent of blunting those critiques and getting back in the game.

Lucid has two new versions of the limited-edition Dream Edition in queue — one that focuses on power and one that focuses on range.

Naturally, their names reflect this focus — they are the Dream Edition Performance and Dream Edition Range.

Software updates. Precisely when we had to start having a conversation about software updates – over the air or otherwise – in an automotive context isn’t something I can answer. We didn’t have them for about 100 years. Then, we did. What’s more, it seems like everyone is more or less OK with that, but should they be? Are these software updates really making your car better, or are they slowly throttling back your car’s performance and functionality in a bid to frustrate you into buying a new one?

Let’s take a few minutes to explore the possibilities.