- Toyota will discontinue the Venza after the 2024 model year.
- Its departure will make room for the mid-size 2025 Toyota Crown Signia.
- The two are quite similar on paper, though the Signia beefs up its offerings a bit.
The Toyota Venza was first a dowdy half-wagon, half-crossover. Then, it was reborn as a hybrid-only SUV known in other markets as the Harrier, which is objectively a cooler name. Now, it will exist only in the hushed whispers of days gone by, as a new mid-size hybrid monarch rises to take the, um, Crown.
Alongside the debut of the 2025 Toyota Crown Signia hybrid SUV, Toyota has confirmed that the Venza will be discontinued after the 2024 model year. The two vehicles occupy nearly the same slice of an already thin mid-size segment, and thus, there can only be one. It’s sort of like Highlander—the movie, not the larger-but-still-mid-size Toyota SUV.
The Venza’s motivation comes from a three-motor hybrid system that produces a net 219 horsepower. That was sufficient, if only mostly so, to get the smaller Venza around. But the Crown Signia beefs things up; its three-motor hybrid brings combined output up to 243 hp. The Venza was never given a towing rating, so people with stuff to move will probably appreciate the fact that the Crown Signia is rated to tow up to 2700 pounds, despite still relying on a continuously variable transmission.
Despite being billed as a mid-sizer, the almost-compact Venza shared a 105.9-inch wheelbase with the RAV4 Hybrid, and we found its cabin relatively compact in practice. Thankfully, while we don’t have official measurements just yet, the Crown Signia’s interior feels more spacious than what it replaces. As cool as it was, the Venza’s trick electrochromic roof—which could change its opacity with the push of a button—will not be returning; the Crown Signia’s top Limited trim has a regular ol’ glass roof instead.
Of course, with this growth in footprint and output will likely come an increase in price. The 2024 Venza starts around $36,315 and peters out around $46,000. The Crown sedan is more expensive than that, so it stands to reason that its new, larger SUV sibling will be even dearer.
Senior Editor
Cars are Andrew Krok’s jam, along with boysenberry. After graduating with a degree in English from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2009, Andrew cut his teeth writing freelance magazine features, and now he has a decade of full-time review experience under his belt. A Chicagoan by birth, he has been a Detroit resident since 2015. Maybe one day he’ll do something about that half-finished engineering degree.
Source: Motor - aranddriver.com
