2025 Kia Tasman Pickup Truck Rendering Depicts New Toyota Tacoma, Chevy Colorado Rival

We already knew that Kia was planning a body-on-frame pickup truck - a potential Ford Ranger/Toyota Hilux rival for markets such as Asia or Oceania, and that it might be called the ‘Tasman’.

However, rumor has it that such a vehicle could also make its way to North America, where it would be thrown in the grinder alongside the likes of the Toyota Tacoma, Chevrolet Colorado, GMC Canyon, Jeep Gladiator, Honda Ridgeline, Nissan Frontier, and that previously mentioned Ranger.

If that were to happen, the Tasman would surely have its work cut out, seeing as how Toyota sold over 234,000 Tacomas last year. Still, if the Korean brand could get in the mix with the likes of the Ford Ranger (32,334 units for 2023) or the GMC Canyon (22,458 units), I’d call that a success.

The Tasman should be successful even if it doesn’t come to North America. Although, it’s surprising that Kia has never gone to market with such a vehicle before, and if you’re going to do it now, you might as well go all-out and make it available pretty much everywhere.

Anyway, word has it that we can expect two Kia-branded pickup trucks in the near future, one of them being the gasoline-powered Tasman, and the other potentially being battery-electric – perhaps a direct rival for the likes of the Ford-F-150 Lightning, Chevy Silverado EV, GMC Sierra EV, Ram 1500 REV, Rivian R1T and of course, the Tesla Cybertruck.

Now that’s going to be a really interesting product to cover, especially since it kind of sounds like it would be future-proof. The Tasman, however, should serve more of a shorter-term purpose, perhaps only for one generation until it could be replaced by a fully electric successor.

We’ve already seen a spied prototype which is believed to be the Tasman, parked in a garage wearing heavy camouflage over its front fascia, door panels and truck bed. We can see the cab though, and the shape of the window frames, whereas its interior appears somewhat spartan in its design.

The entire vehicle is rather boxy, which is by no means a bad thing since compact pickup truck buyers do tend to appreciate a rugged aesthetic. That’s exactly what this latest rendering from Kolesa appears to show, a rugged, no-nonsense design that would help the Tasman potentially feel right at home among North American and Japanese rivals.

Do I think Kia could conquer this segment to some extent? No, I don’t. But they could carve themselves a decent piece from whatever is already there for the taking.