Utes

There might not be a better time to buy that new car you’ve been thinking about.

Ford's new Super Duty is born from the demands of its buyers, but can the brand capture that Raptor magic in creating an entirely new dual-cab niche?

Nissan's slick new ute has taken a surprising turn. It was previously thought the Nissan Frontier Pro ute would only launch with a plug-in hybrid set-up, but it has now been revealed with a petrol and diesel engine options in China.The Frontier Pro PHEV is destined for a global launch, with Australia potentially on the cards. Nissan Oceania Vice President and Managing Director Andrew Humberstone said that the brand is working on getting the ute down under. “New Navara and Frontier Pro together? Oh, yeah, absolutely,” he said to CarsGuide.“And it wouldn't be one or the other. I would absolutely see an opportunity for both of them (in Australia).”The Frontier Pro plug-in hybrid has a 1.5-litre turbo-petrol engine, with a single electric motor producing 320kW and 800Nm. Its pure electric driving range is 135km according to the very generous CLTC testing system. The new petrol and diesel engines put it on a collision course with some of the biggest sellers in Australia, such as the Ford Ranger and Toyota HiLux.The 2.0-litre turbo-petrol engine produces 192kW and 400Nm, while the 2.3-litre turbo-diesel motor produces 140kW and 500Nm. Both are paired with an eight-speed automatic transmission. The Frontier Pro came about as a joint venture between Nissan and Dongfeng Motor Group and is designed and built in China. This will be the first time one of Nissan’s Chinese vehicles will take on the global market. Nissan currently sells the Navara ute in Australia, which comes exclusively with a 2.3-litre turbo-diesel engine. The brand recently announced a new D27-series Navara, which will launch in the first quarter of 2026 and will be tasked with turning around a tough sales decline. The current generation Navara starts from $36,428 (before on-road costs) for the single cab chassis, with the whole Navara range mustering less than 6,500 sales so far in 2025. This leaves it far behind many of its rivals such as the Ford Ranger, Toyota HiLux and Isuzu D-Max, who collectively are approaching 100,000 sales in 2025. The plug-in hybrid variant of the Frontier Pro would have to hunt down BYD’s Shark 6, which has had an excellent start to life in Australia, with more than 15,000 sales in Australia. A new diesel variant, if it were to come to Australia, would go into direct competition with the big hitters of the segment. 

Nissan tried but failed with its previous (and maybe last-ever) in-house-developed diesel one-tonne ute, the D23 Navara. For 2026, the "all-new" D27 Navara is a mildly-restyled Mitsubishi (MV) Triton, and might only be Australia/New Zealand-only, for now. But there is one massive difference, and that is the retuned suspension, courtesy of Melbourne's Premcar, that is behind the Warrior series.

Volkswagen has conceded defeat in the fight against Ford’s Ranger Raptor.Just weeks away from revealing the details of the second-generation Walkinshaw collaboration on the Amarok ute Volkswagen Australia commercial vehicles boss Nathan Johnson has played down the notion that it will ‘attack’ Ford’s performance ute hero.“We're just trying to enhance the Volkswagen Amarok appeal in terms of what we're doing,” Johnson told CarsGuide. “We're not trying to go and say that we're gonna attack Raptor. Raptor works in its own space and we'd be silly to kind of just say that we're coming after Raptor because Raptor is such a part of the Australian psyche, everyone wants one.“We've gotta play to our own tune here and work what we think will work for Amarok. And I think we've got a pretty good package that's coming.”Volkswagen Australia first partnered with Walkinshaw for the so-called ‘W Series’ Amaroks in the final years of the previous generation ute. While there was always a plan to continue, the two parties haven’t rushed the development of this new iteration, spending more than two years developing the new hero model for the Amarok line-up.“ It's taken a while from face value because we spoke about it quite early on,” Johnson said. “Because to be quite honest with you, the day that we launched Amarok, the first question I had in an interview as a product manager was ‘when is the Walkinshaw Amarok coming?’”While he ruled out a direct challenger to the Ranger Raptor, Johnson was adamant that the long development time will result in a vehicle that is unique in the market and will have its own appeal.“ I think it's a very different scenario ,” he said. “The previous Amarok we were coming to the end of production and it was very different in terms of how we worked on that car and how we pushed it.“This one was very different in terms of, we'd only started production. We're taking a very different approach to this car in terms of the previous one we had to obviously… compromise on a few things that we really wanted to do with our car. With the time period we had and we could have made some decisions to move down different routes, but it probably would've compromised the end product and so forth. So we made the decision not to.“Whereas this time around we've got time, we've got time on our hands and we've been working with Walkinshaw a long time on this to make sure that we can assess everything and make sure that we are working with the right partners, developing all the different bits, the components of the car, and then actually doing a really strong testing program.”Volkswagen reportedly finalised the design of the new Walkinshaw Amarok earlier this year, in April, and has been testing since then.

GWM has admitted there is still plenty of work left to do to boost the popularity of its entry-level Cannon 4x2 and 4x4 range in Australia. Whilst recording a decent 19 per cent volume rise year-to-date, to just under 7000 units, on the back of a significant diesel engine and transmission upgrade earlier this year as part of 2025 facelift, the keenly-priced Chinese mid-sized ute is only in seventh spot.

Nissan’s last great hope of reversing a long-term sales decline in Australia has finally been unveiled in the form of the D27-series of Navara.

Hyundai might have just let slip its big new secret.

Toyota says HiLux buyers want "a ute, not a Rolls-Royce", as criticism over the brand's long-awaited workhorse's update mounts on the brand's own channels. 

Finally, a new HiLux! A vehicle Toyota has been plotting and planning for a decade. And I know what you must be thinking: what the hell were they doing with the other nine-and-a-half years?