2025 Hyundai Tiburon N imagined

With Honda bringing back the Prelude, Nissan eying the return of the Silvia/200SX and Toyota rumoured to be working on a new-generation Celica and MR2 duo, the outlook for affordable sports cars is bright.

One look at the track record of the Subaru BRZ/Toyota 86 twins and the ongoing popularity of the Nissan Z, Toyota Supra and Ford Mustang hammers the point home that Australia still has an affinity for coupes, potentially opening the door up for another contender.

The Hyundai Tiburon made a name of itself in the 2000s (following on from the preceding Hyundai Coupe) as a very affordable and competent little coupe offering some decent sports car dynamics owing to its punchy engine, small size and light weight.

The 2.7-litre V6 was the pick of the bunch, especially when paired with a manual transmission, and is looked back on fondly by its fans and previous owners.

Well now the Tiburon name is back in the limelight following the release of these unofficial renders by Camshaft imagining what an N Performance coupe might look like in the coming years, even if Hyundai has no public intent on launching such a product.

Dubbed the 2025 Hyundai Tiburon N, the renders seemingly use a Subaru BRZ as the basis for both versions – note the differing wheel designs and body lines – over which a collection of Tucson-inspired panels and features are overlaid.

Finished in performance blue and paired with a suitably sporty interior, both creations look the part and wouldn’t be all that complex to develop seeing as Hyundai could leverage the platform and mechanicals of the existing i30 Sedan N, just as the old Veloster Turbo was essentially an i30 N-Line in a tracksuit.

carsales asked Hyundai Australia if a reborn Tiburon and/or Veloster was something it would like to see in the future given the vast number of rivals studying similar models, but the brand declined to comment.

If such a thing was in the pipeline there are a couple of avenues it could take, the first being the most logical and cost effective: a two-door i30 Sedan N – shorten the wheelbase, slap on a two-door body and away you go.

The second is a high-performance hybrid system of some description – something already being studied for future N products – and the third would be a battery-electric system, though this would undoubtedly drive the asking price up compared to some rivals and potentially hinder the Tiburon N’s track capabilities.

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