'Baby' 2025 Toyota Land Cruiser Has Almost Arrived, Currently Only in Digital Form

When the tally came in, General Motors revealed it delivered 2.6 million units to the US market, and that was enough to end the year on top – ahead of Toyota's barrage of all-new, first-ever, and refreshed introductions that helped it sell more than 2.24 million vehicles and way ahead of the second-largest US automaker, the Ford Motor Company.

The Japanese automaker is not giving up, though, as there are more things to come to market – including the N400 Tacoma in hybridized 326-hp i-Force Max form alongside its powertrain and platform sibling, the 2024 Land Cruiser. Toyota is also preparing for the 2025 model year with the all-new and hybrid-exclusive Camry mid-size sedan plus the first-ever Crown Signia crossover SUV, which is unfortunately set to replace the affordable Venza on the US market.

However, not everyone thinks that is enough to conquer the laurels at the end of 2024. Instead, the rumor mill believes that Toyota is hiding a lot of trump cards in their US headquarters' vaults, from a potential revival of the Stout nameplate or a Corolla Cross derivative to fight the Ford Maverick and Hyundai Santa Cruz across the unibody compact pickup truck sector to a 'baby' Land Cruiser that will use the same modular TNGA-F body-on-frame platform in a more compact format.

Of course, the imaginative realm of digital car content creators has its favorites. For example, the Halo oto channel on YouTube provides fresh automotive info corroborated with their virtual designs; now, there are some new CGI ideas about a tiny Toyota – yet again. Like many other outlets, they too – along with their resident pixel master – have envisioned on more than one occasion the rumored 'Land Hopper' and the potential 'Land Cruiser FJ.'

Now they have new renders of the baby Land Cruiser that will presumably clash with Ford's rugged Bronco Sport if it becomes a reality and gets introduced to the US market, too, not just some far-away international markets. As for what's under the hood, no one really knows precisely since even the 2024 Land Cruiser has different powertrains based on regional needs.

However, don't expect the 326-hp i-Force Max to get dropped in the lighter and more compact 'baby' Land Cruiser. Instead, we suspect that something from the Corolla Cross or Corolla Cross Hybrid will be deemed a lot more appropriate and economically feasible for the compact SUV. Secretly, though, we hope Toyota amazes everyone and launches this with Prius Prime's 220-horsepower plug-in hybrid setup. Wouldn't that be a major blow for the competition?