The 2026 Toyota RAV4 GR Sport is genuinely fun to drive – and hopefully a trendsetter

When I reviewed the Aston Martin DBX DBX last month I gathered why SUVs work well, and why adopting one will improve your life, but it’s easy to say that the SUV in question has 785,000 horses. There are plenty of great performance SUVs with five-figure price tags and reasonable Horsepower prices out there, but only a few years ago only a handful of them were available in mid-range production.

Toyota clearly recognized this gaping hole in the market and is filling it with the 2026 rav4 gr Sport. This is not just a rav4 with a bodykit and badges attached – developed in collaboration with the Gazoo Racing division alongside the GR Sport Sport that they have achieved, This thing is truly fun to drive, completely different from the standard rav4 while still being one of the best selling suvs. And, I mean, just look! Rav4 Gr games are the kind of crossover I’ve been waiting for.

Full Disclosure: Toyota Flew to me in Phoenix, put me up in a hotel and I was hungry for two days so I could drive the whole rav4 rav4.

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hell yeah

No, seriously, the rav4 gr game looks great. It has a unique front bumper with a large low green flared active air curtains with vertical LED running lights, a design similar to the GR COROLLA. The 20-inch wheels are about 5 pounds lighter than the standard rav4’s 20s, and are wrapped in Dunlop Sportmaxx summer performance tires. Behind the five-part design are red car-brake calipers. The entire exterior track is gloss black, of course, and the wheel arches are wide.

Best of all is the large rear spoiler, which increases fishing, although Torota doesn’t say how much. Most importantly, it looks sick, standing tall above the roof with a silhouette shaped like the edge of the rear window. The GR Sport’s suspension is 0.6 inch lower, and the track is 0.8 inch wider, improving the rav4’s already good stance. I think I really like how the sport gr looks because it reminds me of the 2001 Toyota RSC, one of my favorite concepts, especially the face and rear hinges.

Real hardware differences

Those are the changes you can see, but there’s a lot you can’t. It gets special coil springs and special tuning and front damping, brace rear suspension and lower power control cover, and a different SPORTE power steering map. Toyota also said it added static-removable material to the front driver’s seat and aluminum tape on the headliner so the suede interior trim won’t drive you, which I can’t see the automaker calling for before.

The GR Sport uses Toyota’s styth-Gen Plug-in-hybrid system, and while it’s the same setup and has the same specs as the other rav4 levels, it’s okay – it has 324 Horsepherower Total, after all. The learlied dead-liter-4 produces 186 HP and pound-feet with its own generator, and it is tied with a motor-generator to be made in front with 203 hp and 201 lb-ft and another electric motor behind 91 lb-ft of torque. Toyota says that the gr game has only about 48 miles long, which is better than other plug-in hybrids on sale, but unlike other CC4 roads, it does not have CCS Phendu for accelerating DC or 11-KW Onboard AC charger. You are attached to the J1772 charging port and the 7-KW Onboard charger, which can take the GR game from 10% to 80% in about four hours.

It will make you smile

All of that adds up to a fun time behind the wheel. The Rav4’s Phev Powertrain is the best; Electric motors are always used for acceleration even when the internal combustion engine is running, so you get an ev-style torque punch when paired with the Whiz of the Motors. Rav4 Phev’s instrument test that comes out of It is about five and a half seconds, and the gr games feel at least two dozen parts. The top speed in EV-only operation is over 80 mph.

Toyota says it wants the gr’ game to be confident and natural, “and the four main areas of improvement were composition, driver response, tracking and entry. After driving it back to back with a regular rav4 vev, it’s much better in all those aspects. The suspension is firm without being uncomfortable, body roll is almost eliminated, and it’s eager to get into corners. Those summer tires are really grippy, and the system All-wheel-drive does a good job of transferring torque between the axles, responding quickly to driver input. Sport Mode makes more of a difference here than in other rav4s in how it tightens the handling and increases power response, and the steering is definitely weighted. Nothing like the kind of feel or response you get from, say, a gr corolla, but the steering of the gr sport is straightforward and easy to make small adjustments.

The Gr Sport has a shift mode made with an electronic CVT, complete with paddle shits, and while clicking the “gears” does not improve the experience, even the sound from the engine is not always good. Toyota Fit the New Rav4 is its first brake-controlled system, which combines friction with regenerative braking to regain as much power as possible while maintaining good foot feel (and good pedals in aluminum sports units).

On the twisty roads around the Saguaro Lake area, the GR Sport’s stance is as refined as SUVs get. The fact that I’m in a bright red Toyota with a lot of luxury is part of the reason for the smile, but this is a fun car to drive even if you don’t take full advantage of its silly value. It helps to be successful, too. In addition to that alone, Toyota estimates the GR sports 41 mpg City, 34 mpg Highway and 37 mpg combined, the best of its tires. A very sensible, sensible purchase, then.

Red bits, because it’s for sports

The GR game also fixes some of the new Rav4’s internal issues. The heated steering wheel is wrapped in full leather, so it’s actually nice to hold unlike normal. Warm and airy heated sports seats with large bolsters with suedenu artificial brin naub centers, as well as red stitching and piping, of course. Sadly, the GR sports the same plastics, uncomfortable armrests and iffy material and build quality as other Rav4s.

This latest generation Rav4 brings a new infotainment system which is a big step for Toyota. The GR Sport comes with a new 12.9-inch central touchscreen and the same 12.3-inch software. You get exclusive GR graphics to boot, too.

There is a very useful new voice assistant, a wireless charger for the phone and a bunch of USB-C ports (the only annoying 15w dynamic that can be used for emergency braking), as well as automatic location monitoring, lane camera recognition. The GR Sport also has standard features such as automatic climate control, power tailgate, rain wipers with de-icer, and remote entry with pushbutton start and pushbutton Start. But it misses out on some of the new rav4’s cool features like the sunroof and head-up which are some of the features.

What’s the average now, anyway?

Toyota hasn’t revealed the price of the rav4 gr sport yet, but it’s not cheap. The plug-in RAV4 XSE XSE starts at $50,135, so it will be more than that at least. “Daniel, that definitely doesn’t allow this to be ‘getting’ SUV performance,” I hear you say, and I understand and somewhat agree with this sentiment. But the average price of a new car in the US is just over $50,000 for the first time, and the Rav4 gr sports no competition at or below that price point, or much lower. I mean, the most basic BMW X3 you can get is $50,900. The starting price with five fronts makes the new rav4 low interior egregious agregious, but all gr games are compelling enough that I don’t care much.

I really don’t know what kind of person will buy the Rav4 GR game, but I hope that people actually do, and that they won’t be consigned to a forgotten chapter in the history books. Despite its roughness – Indeed, because of its roughness – it deserves to be taken seriously as a true passion machine. And if the game gr. I would like to see a honda CR-v si, a hyundai tucson n, a subaru Foresters STI. You know you want a mazdospeed cx-5. And maybe down the line Toyota will make a crazier gr rav4 … a man can dream.

Y’ALL may not want to hear it, but there are tons of people out there who enjoy driving and, at any given time, want or need to buy an SUV. They shouldn’t have to miss out on great performance because of it – and with the Toyota Rav4 Gr Sport, they’ll get great performance,.

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