Robert Ackers
Summary
- Toyota will unveil the GR GT supercar on December 5, aimed at competing with Aston Martin DB12.
- The GR GT will likely feature a high-revving V8 with hybrid assistance, targeting around 700bhp.
Toyota will lift the covers on its long-teased V8 supercar, now officially called the GR GT, on 5 December — a road-going rival aimed squarely at the Aston Martin DB12 and built to homologate Toyota’s new GT3 racer.
The GR GT traces its roots through a steady preview programme (including concept showings at Pebble Beach and running prototypes at Goodwood’s Festival of Speed). Toyota says the production variant will be closely related to the GT3 GR race car: homologation rules mean the race car must share its basic body with a road car, so Toyota is creating a street-legal counterpart as part of the process. The GR GT will make a first public appearance at the Tokyo Auto Salon in January.
Technical details remain guarded, but the clues so far are telling. The GT3 prototype’s soundtrack and on-track behaviour point to a high-revving V8, while the race car is expected to produce around 500–600bhp and keep weight under 1,300kg to meet GT3 rules. Insiders and Toyota’s quieter road mules suggest the production GR GT will add hybrid assistance — both to meet emissions rules and to lift combined output, with road figures rumoured to approach 700bhp, putting it in Aston Martin Vantage S territory.
Toyota’s engineers are explicit that hybridisation is being tested across GR projects — not as a denial of combustion, but as a way to keep performance and comply with tightening regulations. Gazoo Racing boss Masahito Watanabe has described the company’s approach as “multi-pathway”: develop electrification and other tech, while still exploring the potential of internal-combustion solutions (including hydrogen) where appropriate.
In short: the GR GT looks set to be a serious, purpose-built supercar — one that exists because Toyota wants a competitive GT3 racer, and because it believes there’s still a place for high-performance, combustion-led machinery in a changing motorsport and road-car landscape. Expect Toyota to fill in the specs and hybrid details at the December reveal.
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