Toyota Finally Leans Into EVs Right As The Industry Reverses Course: Report

Toyota has spent the last 15 years as close to ignoring the industry’s transition to electric vehicles as it possibly could. The Japanese brand put all its efficiency eggs in the hybrid basket, and the strategy has thus far paid off quite well. Nearly every automaker on the planet pushed full steam ahead into the electric future, investing heavily in infrastructure and building state-of-the-art battery facilities around the world. According to the Nikkei newspaper in Japan, Toyota is shifting its focus into a full court press on EVs in the next couple of years. With only the bZ4X and its Lexus RZ counterpart representing Toyota at the U.S. market BEV table, reports indicate that Toyota “aims to have about 15 electric vehicle models developed on its own by 2027” with a goal of producing about a million EVs annually at that point. 

Curiously, Automotive News Europe asked Toyota for comment on the story, and instead of an outright denial, the company declined to provide a comment. The “information was not announced by” Toyota. 

Across all of 2024 Toyota sold just 140,000 EVs globally, including the hydrogen fuel cell EV Mirai. While that’s a big improvement over 2023, it means EVs accounted for just two percent of Toyota’s global car sales. Assuming total global sales stay about the same, Toyota’s ambitious EV roadmap aims for about 35% of global production shifting to EV by the end of the decade. 

Back in 2021 Akio Toyoda laid out a roadmap for electrification of the Toyota and Lexus brands. In defiance of the rest of the market, he refused to set a date for a full-electric Toyota, and the company continues on this path today. The company and its board have vowed to follow the market and push electrification only where and when it makes sense. So for Toyota to be finally ready to push into the EV market in a big way, while watching nearly every other automaker walk back promises and delay further EV models, perhaps once again the world’s most sensible automaker knows something the rest of the world doesn’t. 

Toyota recently launched the battery-electric C-HR+ in Europe, with a rumored $30,000 starting price, to great fanfare. The compact $15,100 bZ3X went on sale last month in China. The larger three-row bZ5X is expected to be among the new EVs launched by Toyota this year, along with its Lexus TZ counterpart. Perhaps the long-rumored Lexus electric supercar will also be among them. Even the Tacoma is getting an electric spin-off model. It’s going to be truly impressive if Toyota can increase its electric vehicle sales around the world by 25 times before 2030, but greater choice and appropriate pricing will certainly be key to making it happen.