All-new Toyota Crown flagship SUV leaked

The first image of the new-generation Toyota Crown appears to have been leaked, with a single image of the segment-blending flagship SUV breaking cover just a handful of hours before the car is officially revealed in the USA.

The jury is still out on exactly how Toyota will reference its new luxury flagship, given it has distinct sedan affectations as you can see from this image, yet features a slightly higher ride height than conventional passenger cars.

SUV, crossover, or perhaps something else?

What’s clear from the leaked image is that Toyota has a newfound courage to push the design envelope and experiment, the new Crown blending an athletic front-end design with a large front air-dam, a thin grille flanked by slim-line LED headlight clusters, a swoopy roof line, large alloy wheels and a slightly raised ride height.

The new Crown is understood to be offered in both left- and right-hand drive for key global markets such as Japan and the USA, but the chances of it coming to Australia extremely low.

“Toyota Australia is continually studying the market for new opportunities to offer exciting new products to Australian customers,” stated a Toyota Australia spokesperson.

“At this stage, however, we have no plans to introduce the Crown model or any of it sub-variants to the Australian market,” they said.

So it appears that despite the radical new Crown SUV’s sedan-like proportions, Toyota’s new flagship will not be seen Down Under for the same reason the Ford Falcon and Holden Commodore were axed here – the Australian auto market’s shift away from traditional large sedans and towards SUVs.

It’s not clear how many derivatives of the new Toyota Crown will be produced, but a trio of high-tech luxury models is not out of the question, with crossover and sedan models potentially being joined by a liftback version.

Powertrain options are certain to include petrol-electric hybrid powerplants and the Crown’s flagship status should see it deliver a range of innovative features and potentially a couple of significant technological advances.

All will be revealed soon in a live stream from the US, which you can check out here.

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