Trademark filing hints at next Toyota Hilux debuting soon

UPDATED: Article has been updated with a revised details regarding the Hilux Travo possibly continuing with the current model’s IMV platform.

The replacement for the current generation now decade old Toyota Hilux has seemingly taken another step towards becoming a reported reality within the next 12 months following the discovery of a nameplate submission in Thailand.

Much debate

Initially rumoured in 2023 as heading for a world premiere in 2025, conflicting reports throughout much of 2024, including a complete lack of spy images of any prototype undergoing testing, seemingly points to the current AN110 Hilux being succeeded in 2025.

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This after the discovery of a so-called “confidential production plan” by Australia’s drive.com.au that referenced 2025 as the year of the reveal.

Further confirming the rumours was Toyota’s Australia’s Vice-President for Sales and Marketing, Sean Hanley, who told carsguide.com.au last year that “you’ll have to wait until ’25” after being asked about how the country’s incoming emissions regulations would impact on the next generation Hilux.

Revo becoming Travo

In the latest discovery, Thailand’s headlightmag.com reports that the name Hilux Travo had been submitted to the country’s Department of Intellectual Property two days before Christmas, suggesting it to be moniker for what will be the ninth generation Hilux.

A continuation of the Hilux being sold with two names in Thailand that started in 1978 when the third generation commenced production as the Hilux Super Star, the Travo will replace the current Revo suffixed model that succeed the Hilux Vigo in 2015.

While likely to apply solely in Thailand, the submission’s filing in the country where the largest portion of global Hilux production takes place, further points to it definitively premiering this year as per the age of the Revo, plus the unlikelihood of Toyota using it as a derivative of the smaller half-ton Hilux Champ.

Change of plan? No TNGA-F?

Although details remain unknown, the report alleges that despite the new moniker, the Hilux Travo will retain certain aspects from the AN110, namely the body and cab.

The most controversial claim though, and contraire to all previous claims, that the continued use of the IMV platform that underpins not only the Hilux Champ, but also the AN110 as well as the Fortuner.

This, therefore, contradicts the claims of the Hilux moving to the TNGA-F platform that debuted with the Land Cruiser 300.

Until now, it was reported that, apart from the platform, the Hilux would feature styling influence from the North American Tacoma and even the Tundra.

This, after a report by MotorTrend in 2021 stated that production of the Hilux and Tacoma would be aligned for the first time since 1995 when the former, then called Toyota Pick-Up, bowed-out in favour of the latter that had been designed according to American-market specification and requirements.

At the same time, the report also mentioned the same as being applicable to the next generation 4Runner and Fortuner, the former unveiled last year and the latter also tipped for a 2025 world debut.

Compared to the petrol-only Tacoma though, the Hilux will most likely continue to offer diesel engines with or without hybrid assistance as in the case of the current Hilux 48V that uses a 48-volt mild-hybrid system of the existing the 2.8 GD-6 oil-burner.

And for South Africa?

If on the cards for debuting this year, a South African unveiling looks poised to happen in 2026 after Toyota South Africa Motors President and CEO Andrew Kirby, told The Citizen at the new Land Cruiser Prado launch in Mozambique last year that the new Hilux “will not be coming to market next year”.

He did, however, confirm the ninth generation as being planned, saying, “[Hilux] is extremely important to us as a business and a company. It is the most important vehicle we manufacture and sell… it is our core model. [The next generation] will have exciting features and upgrades I think our customers will enjoy”.

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