Nissan is shelving its planned US-made EV, but will move ahead with the new Xterra.
While it’s been out of circulation for a decade now, it’s probably one of the industry’s worst-kept secrets that Nissan plans to revive the Xterra SUV. Now, though, Nissan Americas chairman Christian Meunier outright confirmed it to Bloomberg — so it’s happening at this point. That said, it’s not happening for a little while yet, as the next-generation Xterra won’t arrive until sometime in calendar year 2028.
Is that all we know about it? Technical details are still thin on the ground, as you might expect this far out. Nevertheless, we do know with certainty that it will be a hybrid model. That tracks with current trends, as automakers broadly pivot away from a headlong rush toward fully electric vehicles in favor of splitting the difference with a powertrain setup that (hopefully) balances both performance and fuel efficiency. At any rate, it should be a fair bit better than the old Xterra, which managed a mediocre 18 mpg on a good day.
“The dealers are super excited because it’s going to be a great example of Nissan coming back,” Meunier told Bloomberg. He also noted its assembly at the automaker’s Canton, Mississippi plant — which formerly built the last three years of the second-generation N50 Xterra — when it does actually make it to the production stage. That revelation effectively puts Nissan’s US-made electric vehicle on pause, and brings the new Xterra to the same facility as the Frontier, which could itself spell some major changes for the Frontier in the relatively near future (nothing there has been confirmed yet).
At this point, we still don’t know exactly how Nissan’s hybrid powertrain for the third-gen Xterra will shake out. Earlier reports suggest it could center around a gasoline V6 engine, of which we could be talking about the automaker’s long-running VQ engine. The VQ series currently powers both the Frontier and the Pathfinder SUV. On the other hand, a more modern evolution of that engine — the VR series powering the Armada — could also be a contender. Or Nissan could do something different altogether.
So, there you have it: Expect a follow-up to one of Nissan’s most beloved off-road SUVs (shown below) in about three years’ time. We’ll provide more updates when more concrete information is available.
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