Range Rover Evoque 2026 News

Is Range Rover planning to go even more upmarket and price out a big chunk of its current buyers? It sure seems that way, with Range Rover’s global boss announcing the removal of the brand’s most affordable models - the Evoque and Velar - from its line-up. Welcome to a new era where high end vehicles could become even more out of reach for most. The news of the Range Rover Evoque and Velar’s end came during an interview Range Rover boss Martin Limpert was giving to British motoring publication Autocar. “The Range Rover Evoque and Range Rover Velar will not be replaced when production of the pair ends later this decade,” Limpert confirmed to Autocar. Not replacing them is a seriously strong clue as to Range Rover’s business model for the coming decade. The 2010s and 2020s saw luxury brands such Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Audi and even Range Rover offer affordable entry models into their ranges. For Mercedes-Benz it was models like the CLA small sedan and GLA small SUV for about $60K - expensive for a small car, cheap for a Benz. It was a great way to top up the brand’s annual takings, with the larger more expensive models bringing home the big bucks. Range Rover did the same with the Evoque and Velar. It was a prestige badge on a budget - in this case less than $100K, which is lots, but compared to the $300K starting price of a full-fat Range Rover, it’s nothing. Sales of the Evoque and Velar, which launched in 2014 and 2017 respectively, have tanked in recent years.   The Evoque’s sales fell 78 per cent from a peak of 2732 in 2016 to 614 in 2025. Why did this happen? I think you know why. Well, I think I know why, and it starts with BYD and ends in Zeekr. Yep, one of the common bits of the feedback we’re getting from our readers is that the most desirable cars now for those looking to spend $50-60K are models such as the BYD Sealion 7 and Zeekr 7X.  Chinese cars are not only fitted with the best electric vehicle tech but they’re now among the most beautifully styled high ending things on the road. The upcoming Range Rover GT is a low-slung-wagon-styled SUV and it will be fully electric, but at an expected $175,000 and an arrival date of 2028, it’s probably too much and too late for previous Evoque buyers who are now in a Zeekr. It’s not like Range Rover should care. The strategy of having a car for (almost) everyone is dead - the Chinese have thwarted that plan, so the way forward is to go where those brands can’t - stratospherically high end. Range Rover knows this and will retreat to make big money through the models its core base is buying. Range Rover’s rugged sister brand Land Rover will offer some affordability with models like the Defender Sport. That’s because the off-road niche of Defender is protected by a whole lot of iconic nostalgia that Evoque and Velar don’t have, plus there aren’t any Chinese models that can do what a Defender can with the iconography to go with it. So it’s a strategic retreat by Range Rover out of an area it can’t compete in and doubling down in the places the Chinese brands can’t get them. What will happen to the Land Rover Discovery model? Sales for this once hugely popular model started at a peak of 2470 in 2016 when the new-generation model launched in Australia and fell by 83.3 per cent in a decade with just 413 sales in 2025. The result is worse than Evoque’s numbers for the same period and yet JLR has confirmed work is underway on a new-gen Discovery. Discovery is also a separate sub brand along with Range Rover and Defender. So along with Discovery there’s also the smaller Discovery Sport.  JLR obviously still thinks there’s a place for the Discovery brand, which it presumably sees filling the role of more family focussed suburban duties, while Range Rover fulfils the glamorous high society ones and Land Rover is for the muddy fields. And that leaves no place for an Evoque or Velar, and not really any budget focussed entry point into what will become a more exclusive group. But that’s probably exactly what JLR wants - exclusivity. For now other prestige brands are still selling more affordable models but as consumers migrate to new brands from China they may follow JLR’s move to higher priced ground to save themselves.

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