The most intriguing new 2022 cars, trucks and SUVs coming from Ford, Toyota, Honda and more
Get ready for a roller coaster 2022. Automakers will fight to launch a flood of new cars, trucks and SUVs despite ongoing challenges as COVID-19 shreds the meticulous supply chains necessary to move them from drawing board to your driveway.
The shift to electric vehicles will intensify, but more in the lack of new models with traditional powerplants than a flood of new EVs hitting the road. While many of 2022’s most talked about SUVs and trucks will be EVs, they’ll initially be built in small numbers, and many will only be available at high prices. EVs' high-volume incursion into mainstream vehicle segments isn’t likely to begin until 2023.
While most attention is focused on EVs, though, a handful of new internal combustion vehicles will account for hundreds of thousands of sales.
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Here’s a look at some of the most intriguing and significant vehicles in both camps. It’s based on the outline for a new-vehicle roundtable discussion featuring IHS Markit Principal Analyst Stephanie Brinley, Consumer Reports Automotive Testing Director Jake Fisher and myself. The Automotive Press Association presented the conversation, which included questions from an audience of top-notch analysts and journalists. You can stream it here.
Some of my thoughts were influenced by the discussion with Brinley and Fisher. But the rants are all mine.
Honda
This year is a massive year for Honda, and by extension, for mainstream American buyers. The automaker has all-new versions of its best-seller, the CR-V compact SUV, the midsize Pilot and Passport SUVs and the subcompact HR-V.
Expect Honda to continue its campaign to bolster its SUVs’ modest off-road capability with references to its rugged ATVs; fender flares and tough-guy grilles, and a few mechanical upgrades. A hybrid CR-V is likely.
Honda’s leadership in safety features is more than skin deep, so don’t be surprised if the brace of SUVs excels there.
Sedan sales have fallen, but the midsize Accord remains one of America’s bestsellers, making the expected update big news to hundreds of thousands of buyers.
The Civic R performance compact will arrive late this year to remind buyers that nobody combines fun, affordability and efficiency better than Honda.
AND THE WINNER IS: Honda Civic, 2022 Free Press Car of the Year
Chevrolet and GMC
GM’s bestselling models, the Chevy Silverado and GMC Sierra full-size pickups, get meaningful technology additions including the Super Cruise highway driving assistant, updated to allow hands-free trailer towing and passing. Chevy and GMC wanted the updated pickups on the road in 2021, but computer chip shortages delayed them. Other upgrades include a 13.4-inch touch screen, and upgraded 2.7L turbocharged base engine.
The ballyhooed electric Silverado and Sierra pickups won’t go on sale until 2023.
The GMC Hummer EV super pickup lineup should grow as production at GM’s Factory Zero cranks up, adding the $99,995 3x model in the fall.
The Corvette ZO6 will make everybody forget about EVs – briefly – when it debuts this summer with a unique 5.5L double-overhead, flat crank version Chevy’s legendary small-block engine.
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Cadillac
The Lyriq SUV, the second vehicle as GM’s ambitious EV rollout finally takes hold, had better be a hit. Packed with new technology, including GM’s internally designed Ultium batteries and motors, this midsize SUV arrives in the absolute sweet spot of the luxury market. Add dynamic styling inside and out and GM’s latest connectivity and entertainment systems and it’ll be a disappointment if this isn’t the vehicle that finally changes the conversation around Cadillac, which got a little image benefit over the last two decades for introducing a sting of great sport sedans and lifting the Escalade to the front of the global luxury market. Base prices of $59,990 make the five-seat Lyriq attainable to any luxury buyer, but look for loaded models to top $100K. It will compete with EVs like the Audi E-tron, Tesla X and Ford Mustang Mach-E.
The public debut of the Celestiq ultra-luxury car also needs to fire buyers’ imaginations. It’s not scheduled to go on sale until 2023, but it has to cause a stir for Cadillac’s latest reinvention to work. That’s a tall order in an SUV-mad market.
WATCH IT IN ACTION: Video of GM testing Cadillac Lyriq electric SUV
Ford
The F-150 Lightning electric pickup is destined to be one of the year’s biggest stories. Ford has already boosted production plans several times, but output will be limited this year. More important than loaded $100,000 King Ranch models, the base $40,000 Lightning work truck must deliver the goods, literally. Relatively few people will buy EVs in the next couple of years, but just about everyone will receive a delivery, get lawn service or see a utility truck at work.
The Lightning pickup work truck and Ford’s upcoming electric Transit delivery van, will play a huge role in public acceptance of EVs.
Ford’s thriving SUV business will benefit from an upgraded Expedition – probably with an outdoorsy Timberline model – and a 400-horsepower Bronco Raptor.
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Mazda
The brand dedicated to defining itself as sporty – Zoom Zoom, y’all – has struggled to fire buyers’ imagination as the market shifted to SUVs. Near-universal disdain for the brand’s first electric vehicle last year didn’t help.
Mazda tries a different tack with the CX-50 compact SUV launching this spring. Built in Alabama alongside the Toyota Corolla Cross, the CX-50 shares a roof – but not its platform drivetrain or any other components – with the smaller Toyota.
Mazda wants to position the CX-50 as more off-road capable than its popular CX-5.
The CX-50 looks great, with a long nose and flared fenders, but initial Mazda presentations that define off-road performance as driving on a dirt road inspire modest expectations.
Toyota and Lexus
The bZ4X compact SUV is Toyota’s latest effort to dispel the perception it’s ambivalent about EVs. What better way to demonstrate your enthusiasm than a ridiculous name and styling that looks like the RAV4 design team broke into the Lexus studio, but the only rendering they could find was in black and white?
Despite the – shall we say – "shortcomings" in its corporate messaging, Toyota has committed billions to developing EVs and batteries, and the b-whatever is first fruit of those labors. Due for sale midyear, it promises to overcome shortcomings of name and style with the automaker’s bulletproof reputation for value and reliability. Toyota promises up to 250 miles on a charge and a “spacious, techy interior with abundant legroom.” It’d be the upset of the year if it doesn’t sell out.
From the land of real names and big engines, expect new versions of the Toyota Sequoia and Lexus LX 600, a pair of big SUVs that use the same architecture as the new Tundra full-size pickup, which itself adds a hybrid model this year.
Lexus also gets a new model of its bestselling model, the RX SUV. The RX is Lexus’ best seller, and the definitive midsize luxury SUV. A hybrid RX model is de rigueur, but Lexus’ first dedicated EV SUV is expected to have a different name when it debuts in the second half. If only bZ4X weren’t taken.
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Jeep and Dodge
This is a slow year for Stellantis USA, after a frantic last half of 2021, when Jeep launched the Grand Cherokee L, Grand Cherokee, Wagoneer and Grand Wagoneer.
A plug-in hybrid version of the new Grand Cherokee should arrive in early 2022. Expect a battery range of about 25 miles. If the PHEV Wrangler 4xe is any model, there’s a big appetite for Jeeps that can run on electricity.
There’s no evidence that’s also true for Dodge, but the affordable-performance brand has been so starved for new vehicles there’s no evidence its customers wouldn’t buy a washing machine if it had a Hemi. That legendary V8 is off the table for the rumored Dodge Hornet compact SUV, but a PHEV is possible.
The Hornet, if it exists, will share its architecture with the Alfa Romeo Tonale, a sporty compact SUV based on an award-winning concept vehicle.
The Tonale, which looks a lot like the midsize Alfa Romeo Stelvio SUV and has a PHEV model, is also rumored to go on sale in the U.S. this year, an overdue addition to Alfa’s painfully thin lineup.
If Alfa and Dodge both get new vehicles in the same year, watch the skies. Pigs may have wings, after all.