First Toyota PHEV could come in 2025

A plug-in hybrid Toyota is inching closer and could arrive in dealerships as soon as this year as the brand looks to expand its electrified options in a market fast adopting hybrids.

It comes as Toyota concedes selling battery electric vehicles (BEVs) is tough, something that has prompted the top-selling car maker to increase its focus on the slow-selling bZ4X.

“There’s no doubt plug-in hybrids will play a big role in Toyota’s portfolio in the next years,” said Sean Hanley, Toyota Australia vice president of sales, marketing and franchise operations, who this week confirmed Toyota sold a record 241,296 new vehicles in 2024.

He said PHEVs and regular hybrids are where the bulk of the electrified vehicle growth will likely be throughout 2025.

“Hybrids and plug-in hybrids (PHEVs) will be what you’ll be talking about in January 2026.”

Already PHEV sales are on the rise, doubling off a low base in 2024, according to sales figures released this week by the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries.

But the 23,163 PHEVs sold in Australia last year is still a fraction of the 91,292 battery electric vehicles sold during the same period.

Regular hybrids – which run purely on petrol – beat them both, growing 75 per cent over 2023 with a record 172,696 sold throughout the year.

Chinese brand BYD led the PHEV growth in 2024, with the Sealion 6 mid-sized SUV accounting for 27 per cent of all PHEV sales.

Toyota dominates in sales of regular hybrid, accounting for about two-thirds of all petrol-electric models sold in Australia. But the brand doesn’t have a single PHEV.

Asked whether the first Toyota PHEV for Australia could arrive this year, Hanley said “possibly”.

It’s the SUV category Hanley believes will be crucial for PHEV sales.

The RAV4 is already available as a PHEV overseas, which could make it an obvious option for Australia.

However, an all-new RAV4 is also expected soon. The current RAV4 arrived in 2019, suggesting its replacement would likely surface sometime this year and be on sale by 2026 at the latest.

And, of course, Toyota has a raft of heavy duty off-roaders – including the Fortuner, Hilux, Prado and LandCruiser – that the company says it will electrify before the end of the decade.

In the shorter term, though, Toyota is gearing up to turn its attention to the bZ4X, which is a minnow in the EV space. Since it arrived in February Toyota has only sold 977 bZ4Xs.

In the same period Tesla sold 20,869 examples of the rival Model Y.

“The BEV market’s hard,” said Hanley. “It’s not easy to sell BEVs in big numbers in the Australian market right now.”

It doesn’t help that the bZ4X is priced from $66,000 plus on-road costs, well up on the Model Y that sells from $55,900.

But Hanley says it will ramp up its efforts to boost sales of the bZ4X ahead of the arrival of two new yet-to-be-identified EVs in 2026.

“We do understand that we need to accelerate BEV sales and we’ll do that by innovating the way we sell those vehicles in future.”

Hanley points to better education and a focus on leasing that includes guaranteed buybacks to alleviate concerns over residual values as important factors.

Whereas Redbook forecasts a top-shelf RAV4 Edge would retain about 57 per cent of its value after five years and 80,000km, the bZ4X is forecast to retain less than half its original purchase price in the same period.

“Things like full-service lease, things like taking the worry or apprehension out of the buying decision, taking the risk out of resale value, taking the risk out of battery anxiety or battery life, the risk out of range anxiety by providing chargers, making them affordable and giving consumers confidence,” said Hanley of measures the company plans to implement to switch more people to EVs.

Not that Toyota is looking like tackling Tesla on EV sales any time soon.

“You don’t have to significantly boost sales,” said Hanley. “You just have to grow it organically.”

EV growth is something set to become more important as the Federal Government’s New Vehicle Efficiency Standard kicks in this year.

The NVES places increasingly tightening limits on CO2 emissions of light vehicles between 2025 and 2029 and places tough penalties on cars that breach the caps.

EVs and other low emissions vehicles can be used to offset thirstier models such as utes and four-wheel drives, giving manufacturers an incentive to sell more.

Given almost half of Toyota’s sales are for off-road and commercial vehicles – none of which currently have electrified options – it increases the incentive for Toyota to sell more EVs.

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