Toyota has a plan, and it is none other than to catch up with – and even surpass – Tesla in terms of electric car production and technology at the beginning of the next decade. This, at first glance, may sound strange, since Elon Musk‘s firm is far ahead of the Japanese company in this area. However, the secret for Toyota could lie in solid electrolyte battery technology, intended to solve the handicaps of electric cars: price, range, and waiting times for recharging.
However, although its promises are many, there would still be a few years left before its final arrival on the mass market. Specifically, it is expected that this will not happen until around 2028. But what will be the specific specifications that the electric cars of the future will present? A roadmap published by the brand itself has already revealed a good part of these secrets, although the company still has doubts about the dates.
Goodbye to ‘range anxiety’ in future electric Toyotas
Solid-state battery technology may be the key to overtaking Tesla and positioning Toyota as a preferred brand in the electric car sector. The dates, a priori, suggest that the brand is already developing this technology and expects it to begin to be implemented in 2027, reaching the mass market a year later. Vikram Gulati, director of Toyota India, assured that “this advance will promote a vehicle that will be charged in 10 minutes, thereby giving a range of 1,200 kilometers. This battery will also have a very high life expectancy.”
In the roadmap presented a few months ago by the brand you can see the steps that Toyota will take in advances in battery technology. The diagram shows the arrival of the bZ4X to the market in 2023; The next step states that in 2026 a new model will arrive (still unknown) that will have a range of more than 800 kilometers and fast charging in approximately 20 minutes. In the following years (between 2026 and 2028), the brand will launch vehicles with ranges between 600 and 1,000 kilometers, although all of them will have liquid electrolyte batteries.
Solid-state batteries will make their appearance in 2027 with the first model with 1,000 kilometers of range and a fast charge in 10 minutes. Later, although without announcing the year of arrival, the aforementioned vehicle with 1,200 kilometers of range would make an appearance.
However, in more recent conversations with managers and managers of the brand in different media, such as the Toyota Times, they have pointed out that, although solid-state batteries could have a great potential for a paradigm shift in electric vehicles, it is not expected. that their massive arrival occurs before 2030 “or beyond. ” That is, despite the roadmap presented by Toyota, there is still room for maneuvering in the dates and this technology could further delay its arrival.
The plans of the Toyota Group (including Lexus) speak of registering around 3.5 million electric cars by 2030. To do this, they plan to launch a total of ten new zero-emission models in the coming years, which will make things difficult for already established brands such as Tesla or BYD.
