Last year, Nissan's American division managed to deliver a total of no less than 899k vehicles – primarily thanks to the namesake Nissan brand rather than its premium Infiniti division, which accounted for just under 65k sales. But it wasn't the most exotic asset – that 'honor' befalls the 2024 GT-R, which only reached 390 new clients in 2023.
However, don't come quickly to berate the Japanese automaker. Its much less expensive $42k 2024 Z fared marginally better at 1,771 deliveries. In contrast, the recently updated 2024 GT-R costs a staggering $121k – and you can even go all the way up to $221k if you select the flagship GT-R Nismo. Interestingly, the year-over-year performance for both the little Z and the big GT-R was astonishing.
As such, the 2024 Z saw a 573% jump in sales because it's an entirely new product that just reached its first full year of sales for the seventh generation – though the same cannot be applied to the GT-R since the R35 iteration has been around since December of 2007! However, the Japanese automaker did update the grand tourer for the 2024 model year, hence the renewed interest in something that's about to become a major collectible item.
This is most likely because the rumor mill believes this will be the R35 GT-R's final model year of production, as previewed by the celebratory GT-R50 anniversary special edition and the 2023 facelift. Whether or not that is entirely true is the knowledge of Nissan's corner office head honchos. On the other hand, the imaginative realm of digital car content creators is also short on patience, so this is probably why the good folks over at the AutomagzPro and Auto Om TV channels on YouTube have interesting yet completely different visions of upcoming R36 greatness.
The resident pixel master from AutomagzPro thought it entirely fitting – with a bit of help from AI software, probably – to get their dreamy version of the R36 Nissan GT-R inspired by the GT-R50 above. That's not a bad idea, as the beautiful special edition is something to behold. Besides, if that were the case with the real GT-R, it would easily keep in touch with the past, present, and future.
However, that may not be it if we are to believe the CGI expert from Auto Om TV because there's another potential source of inspiration – the Nissan Hyper Force concept from the Hyper series of prototypes that were introduced last year. As such, their R36 Nissan GT-R would come out to party in the real world looking a lot more futuristic – and possibly also equipped with a fully electric powertrain. So, which one is your favorite – the GT-R50-like version or the one that feels taken directly from a video game?
Aurel has aimed high all his life (literally, at 16 he was flying gliders all by himself) so in 2006 he switched careers and got hired as a writer at his favorite magazine. Since then, his work has been published both by print and online outlets, most recently right here, on autoevolution. Full profile
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