New Nissan X-Terra Goes Back to the Digital Frontier, Looks Ready for North America

Back in the day (between 1999 and 2015, across just a couple of generations), the Nissan Xterra was a rugged, tough, affordable truck-based compact SUV. It shared a lot of love with the equivalent NP300/Navara/Frontier pickup, including the body-on-frame platform, as well as numerous front design elements.

When it was revived as the Asian ‘Terra’ and Middle Eastern ‘X-Terra,’ though, it changed to a mid-size SUV sold across various markets, including China, and positioned between the compact X-Trail/Rogue crossover and the full-size Patrol/Armada SUV. Naturally based on the Navara pickup truck, it went on to fulfill the gap left across various markets by the R51 Pathfinder and China’s Paladin, and only offers inline-four gasoline or diesel engines.

Logic dictates that Nissan does not need an Xterra successor for North America, as its U.S. lineup already includes a big SUV family consisting of Rogue, Murano, Pathfinder, and Armada models. However, the imaginative realm of virtual automotive artists usually does not take ‘no’ for an answer. So, here is Dimas Ramadhan, the pixel master behind the Digimods DESIGN channel on YouTube, who has taken up the task of revealing an all-new X-Terra that also seems fit for the Americas – albeit only in CGI.

Remember, the original Xterra was based on the Navara/Frontier pickup model, but now the latter have different journeys ahead of them. That is because the international NP300/Navara models were separated from the third-generation 2022 Frontier for the North American market. The latter is now offered as a dedicated version of the mid-size pickup truck riding on the Nissan F-Alpha platform with expanded dimensions and a 310-hp 3.8-liter V6 hooked to a nine-speed automatic and 4x2 or 4x4.

And the CGI expert probably saw it fitting to rekindle the rumor that Nissan’s X-Terra might end up living the American dream once again, after all. Well, the U.S.-market Frontier influences are pretty obvious, at least at the front, whereas the rear styling is a lot quirkier, and also features a ‘Black Edition’ moniker without actually having a lot of dark, contrasting cues.

However, that is not the main cause of discontent, at least for me. Instead, if my two cents on the CGI matter were allowed, I would have opted for the Frontier Pro-4X front fascia DNA instead of the perceived Frontier SV design, even if that meant the affordability part of the X-Terra equation went down the drain. This is because, somehow, the CGI translation makes the SUV look dated already.