The Toyota bZ4X Gains Significant Improvements and a New Name for 2026
The Toyota bZ4X has been around for a couple of years now, but it hasn’t made a significant impact due to a few lingering issues, including its range and charging speeds. Toyota has pledged to address those issues with the 2026 bZ, which drops the last half of the too-complicated name and gains a larger battery.
The Toyota bZ4X has been around for a couple of years now, but it hasn’t made a significant impact due to a few lingering issues, including its range and charging speeds. Toyota has pledged to address those issues with the 2026 bZ, which drops the last half of the too-complicated name and gains a larger battery.
Toyota will equip a Tesla NACS charging port for the new EVs and said the charging upgrades help it recover from a 10 to 80 percent state of charge in around 30 minutes. The new bZ also features plug and charge capability.
Power output got a boost, increasing by 50 percent for all-wheel drive models to 338 combined horsepower. That improves the SUV’s 0-60 mph time to 4.9 seconds. Front-drive models also saw a bump in output, now delivering 221 horsepower compared to the previous year’s 201. New eAxle electric motor designs aid in that improvement, using upgraded semiconductors to deliver a higher power output. The XLE and Limited trims picked up a new 74.7-kWh battery for 2026, which improves their range to 314 miles. Toyota equips a smaller 57.7-kWh battery in XLE FWD models.
Those upgrades should make the new bZ much more competitive, but they came a bit later than necessary. The SUV will start arriving at Toyota dealerships later this year, and pricing details will become available closer to the launch.
[Images: Toyota]
Become a TTAC insider. Get the latest news, features, TTAC takes, and everything else that gets to the truth about cars first by subscribing to our newsletter.
