Toyota confirms the return of the Celica

Updated: 29 November 2024

► Toyota’s VP broke the news
► The eighth-generation Celica is on the way
► And it won’t be powered by electricity

SEGA rally fans rejoice! Toyota has confirmed it’ll soon remake the iconic Celica GT-Four. The news broke during a fan event at Rally Japan, in a Q&A session with Toyota’s top brass.

Some brave soul in the crowd asked Akio Toyoda (the company’s chairman of the board of directors) whether a new Celica was on the way, to which he said: ‘I can’t answer that – but there’s an executive here, so I’ll ask him.’

The executive in question was Yuki Nakajimi, Toyota’s executive vice president of product. He said, rather bluntly, ‘we’re doing the Celica.’ Which is about as solid as evidence gets. Why can’t all car manufacturers be so open about their product plans?

What’ll power the new Toyota Celica?

Toyota hasn’t confirmed that yet, but we very much doubt it’ll powered by electricity. That’s because, in summer 2024, Mazda, Subaru and Toyota released a joint statement in which they announced they’d all build a new generation of cleaner combustion engines.

Toyota is currently developing a pair of 1.5-litre and 2.0-litre four-cylinder petrol units (the 2.0-litre is pictured below). They’re smaller, lighter and more efficient than the brand’s current engines – and they’ve both been designed to work with hybrid assistance. Crucially for the Celica project, though, neither engine is tied to hybrid power.

Toyota's next-generation 2.0-litre four-cylinder petrol engine,

We also know the 2.0-litre engine was designed for a broad range of high-output applications, from heavy-duty trucks to sports cars. What’s more, Toyota has confirmed it’ll have much more poke than its current 2.4-litre four-cylinder petrol engine. When it’s teamed with a turbocharger, it could kick out as much as 400bhp.

As for the drivetrain, Toyota already has already designed a fantastic four-wheel drive system for the GR Corolla, so it should just be a simple case of mating the new engine to this existing running gear and then dropping it into a swoopy coupe bodyshell.

And, as luck would have it, the firm has already done just that. Well, sort of. For SEMA 2024, Toyota built a four-wheel drive version of the GR86 (pictured below) that had more than a passing resemblance to the 1990s Celica GT-Four rally hotshot. It even wore its grandfather’s race livery.

Toyota GR96 rally concept: front driving, off-road

Granted, that concept also used the Corolla’s 1.6-litre three-cylinder engine – but it also used its four-wheel drive system, which is something the the GR86’s platform was never designed to accept. So, if Toyota can manage that, packaging everything into a car that was designed to accept a four-wheel drive system on the drawing board should be a walk in the park. Exciting times lie ahead.

We should also mention that, because our Japanese lessons haven’t started paying off yet, we used the Japanese motoring magazine BestCar to help us compile this report.

By Luke Wilkinson

Deputy Editor of Parkers. Unhealthy obsession with classic Minis and old Alfas. Impenetrable Cumbrian accent

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