Car enthusiasts adore the original Lexus LS for its incredible stoutness and Japanese take on German luxury. That’s not what everyone bought, though. The Lexus ES was less a meditation on Tuetonic elegance and more a radical reinterpretation of what elegance could be: affordable, reliable, and comfortable. It worked. The ES, more than any other car, is what propelled the brand to the forefront of premium cars globally.
That’s why it’s so important that there’s a new one and, for the first time since its debut in 1989, it has completely rethought what a luxury car from Lexus could be. This is the 2026 Lexus ES, which recently debuted at Shanghai’s Auto Show and is now a multi-platform vehicle available only as a hybrid (Lexus ES350h), FWD EV (Lexus ES350e), or premium AWD (Lexus ES500e).
It even looks like a big leap from the current model, although we’re measuring that distance in Lexus sedan design, which has always been centimeters and not yards. The fact that this thing has to support an underfloor battery pack means that it has to be rethought in a taller form.
Some people will love it and others will hate it. I’m not a huge fan of the current Lexus ES so I like this taller form. People complained that the new Lexus RX got too radical, which stopped almost no one from going out and buying one.
Obviously, from this perspective, you can see the same TNGA GA-K platform that also underpins the 2025 Toyota Camry, which is hybrid-only but currently doesn’t offer an all-electric version. Here’s how our own Alanis King described the vehicle:
The XLE I drove was front-wheel drive, had 225 horsepower, and started at $33,400. It also gets a manufacturer-estimated 48 mpg in the city, 47 on the highway, and 47 combined. All-wheel-drive models send power to the rear wheels through a dedicated rear electric motor, which gives the car additional traction when you need it: bad weather, acceleration, and other traction-hungry situations.
I drove the Camry in the mountains and enjoyed it. The steering was responsive and well-weighted, not too light or too heavy. The pedals had tension and didn’t feel squishy. There wasn’t a ton of weight transfer in the turns, and you could take turns quickly. It was fun — not numb or boring — and that’s cool for a Camry.
That should compare somewhat to the entry-level Lexus ES350h, although expect some specific tuning of the ES to make it feel a little nicer. The ES now gets a multi-link rear suspension, a first for the ES, to go with a MacPherson setup out front.
As with previous Camry/ES pairs, the interior of the ES is going to be a nicer place to hang out. Lexus calls this interior concept tazuna and describes it as “a driver-focused” layout, including “a low-profile meter hood housing a uniquely shaped 12.3-inch multi-information display, enabling smooth eye movement and creating an open, airy feel. A special coating enhances surface quality, while the combination of suede materials and ambient lighting deepens the expression of the tazuna concept.”
Compare that to the Camry:
Differentiated enough, I think, to keep it a real Lexus ES. The “driver focused” part is a little more questionable given that there’s an obvious lack of physical buttons. Other automakers are starting to learn that buttons are more than a nice-to-have, although the Tesla Model Y became the best-selling car in the world with not many of them. Lexus did state that the car has “responsive hidden switches,” so maybe those are real? It sounds a bit like touch-capacitive buttons to me.
What you’re seeing here is the rear of the EV version of the car, and that’s the big news. This is the first-ever fully BEV Lexus ES.
A large-capacity battery is positioned beneath the floor to lower the center of gravity and enhance driving stability. Furthermore, the ES 500e is equipped with DIRECT4 AWD, an intelligent all-wheel drive system that continuously adjusts torque distribution to all four wheels based on road conditions and driving inputs. The system uses a drive force ratio between the front and rear wheels, ranging from 100:0 to 0:100. This enhances acceleration from a standstill, provides greater handling stability and contributes to great energy efficiency.
Does this mean we can get an all-electric Toyota Camry? Every automaker can sense the blood in the water as Tesla continues to take a beating in the marketplace.
How far will one go? The only estimate we get from Lexus is that the ES350e will get a “manufacturer-estimated range” of 300 miles when equipped with 19-inch wheels. Toyota’s global media site has a lot more information, including range and acceleration times.
At least globally, the base front-wheel drive 300h will get a 2.0-liter naturally aspirated inline-four good for about 200 horsepower and a 0-62 mph time of 9.24 seconds. Step up to the AWD or FWD 350h and there’s the familiar 2.5-liter inline-four, good for somewhere around 250 horsepower in AWD mode and a 62 mph sprint that should happen sub-8 seconds. Not blistering times, but if the ES can return better than 45 mpg mileage, do you really care?
And what about the EVs? The FWD ES350e offers a slow-for-an-ev 8.9 seconds time, but a range marked as 685 km on the Chinese CLTC standard. The AWD model is way quicker, offering a sub-6 0-62 mph time, though a shortened range to 610 km, which might translate to somewhere between 250-275 miles on the EPA test. Unfortunately, comparing CLTC to EPA is not an exact science, so anywhere from a 20-30% haircut is possible.
With available 150 kW charging, Toyota says you can expect a 10-80% charge in about 30 minutes under optimal temperature. These aren’t mind-blowing numbers, but the ES isn’t about blowing minds, it’s about calming them.
I have to say, that I like the look. Its far better than the gaping maw of the current model.
I’m interested. Need to know more about buttons, though. I will never again allow my HVAC to be behind a touchscreen.
They’re capacitive touch buttons, like in the Nissan Aria. Horrible move on Lexus’ part when the market has made it clear that nobody wants that garbage.
Could do without the crying mascara look, but otherwise intrigued. I see a lot to like heere, same as with the Crown.
I get a lot of Crown vibes from the greenhouse. Is that on the Camry platform as well?
Yes, it is. Having driven the current Camry Hybrid as a rental it is an overall satisfactory car.
I considered the new Camry, and if I was gonna buy another hybrid, Toyota or Honda would be the only brands I would buy one from. The new Camry looks pretty good too, and that teal it is available in is pretty good.
Currently own a ’14 Camry SE hybrid, looking closely at the newer Camry and Accord hybrids to replace with when ready.
I’ll put it this way: I’m glad I bought a 2025 ES 350 Ultra Luxury. Last of the good ones, if you will.
This looks terrible. I don’t like much about it. Worthy of particular criticism are the weird staggered bulges in the hood, the wide expanse where a grille ought to be, and those side graphics. Oh, and the cabin is just austere, especially that cheap steering wheel airbag cover with the Lexus word mark; there was a way to do that, and this wasn’t it.
One thing that probably was a wise move was to give this car a taller seating position, like the related Crown. As much as I dislike the way they look, these tall sedans do seem to be where things are trending, and the ES has a lot of older buyers.
Oh, and lastly, at 202.3 inches in length, per Lexus’ spec sheet, this thing is freaking huge. By contrast, my 2005 VW Phaeton V8 is 203.7 inches long (and it’s the LWB). The outgoing ES is 195.9 inches long. Both of those cars sit in my garage currently.
Eh, disagree on the terrible looks. It looks like a Lexus, that is, an attempt at metal origami. The contour lines are busy and there’s too many of them, but they are at least coherent. Plus Lexus has some of the best paint colors around.
I am neither offended nor awed, which is probably what they were shooting for.
I don’t know where you’re seeing any coherence with this design. The front, side, and rear could all belong to different cars, and every little aesthetic detail only exists to hide some other aesthetic detail they didn’t fully think through.
Yeah? What you said is true for everything Lexus makes (my general impression, can’t be bothered to brush up on the current offerings). But the lines are coherent in that they run from one central location and mostly don’t clash with each other. I’m not saying it’s great, but there are much worse examples for sale today (like anything BMW is selling). Like, for me it’s a 4/10, solid ‘meh’.
I nearly did a double take at the size. They’ve finally grew to the physical size of years of GM’s FWD full-size sedans. At least outside, if it’s like Toyota’s other models of late it won’t be quite as space efficient inside as other models (but perhaps that’s been from hybrid battery packaging).
As someone who happily owned the most recent generation IS350 (before my GR Corolla), I’m with you on this – using the RZ design language on a sedan just looks awful. I was already skeptical of the new direction for Lexus when they announced the push for big touch screens with their implementation of Toyota Connected, but the execution here as a whole is starting to cement for me that Lexus no longer wants my business. The exterior is disjointed and not elegant at all – and with a godawful piano black strip down the doors? No thank you. As for the interior, VW is laughing on the other side of the room at people calling them tone deaf to their customers – the market has spoken on capacitive touch controls, and people don’t like them. Why push forward and implement this anyway, on the largest volume sedan they make? The screens…well…if I wanted a Tesla, I’d buy a Tesla. Toyota is better than this…there’s so much about it that just looks like a cheap badge engineer of a Chinese EV….Lexus needs to do better.
I like it. It’s different but not as fussy as uh…almost everybody else. It looks like what the Honda Clarity should have looked like. I was hoping for a turbo-hybrid setup but the EV option is a nice surprise. Maybe we’ll get the turbo-hybrid in a GR Camry…
So is this a lot smaller than the outgoing Avalon-based model? Between that and the new design I don’t know if the traditional core ES consumer will want to drive this to their 4:00 dinner reservation.
I thought it isn’t shorter but taller because of the EV parts, changes the proportions to look shorter.
The cutaway view shows this thing is actually huge. Most downsized late ’70s – ’90s full sizers look bigger than they are due to being relatively short in height. Look at someone actually seated in a Panther body. Lower, longer, wider.
It’s a lot larger. I have a 2025 ES; it’s 195.9 inches. This one is 202.3 inches. That’s within spitting distance of LWB large sedans.
If this seems shorter in length, it’s because it’s also taller. It looks like they raised the seating position and height, much as on the Crown Sedan.
I think the traditional core Lexus customer will like the seating position, if not the design.
I guess I’m the only one who likes how it looks. Origami seems appropriate.
I like it too, the AWD hybrid is tempting.
The pics make it look a little claustrophobic to me, I don’t get why they need a wall between the driver and passenger.
The inlay (bamboo?) on the door panels is cool. That Lexus rose gold color might be the best modern car color, it’s soooo good. The proportions aren’t bad, but there’s a TON of surfacing that’s doing a lot of work to try to break up the bulky side profile. I’m betting that in person this thing is an absolute chonk. The quoted 0-60 times and range are absolutely woeful for something in this market segment, though. I get that you don’t buy an ES for the neck-snapping acceleration but 9+ seconds is shameful in this day and age.
The rose gold is cool but I really like Nori Green
It’s 80% Civic and with nearly a 9 second 0-60 I feel like I’m back in the 80s.
I’m clearly not the market for these.
I mostly like it but it doesn’t seem like an ES, more like a thicker IS. Or, what a new GS would look like.
The release on the Lexus USA newsroom site has a few specs, including a preliminary 300 mile est. range for the ES350e on 19″ wheels.
It mentions a (long) 116″ wheelbase and 202.3″ length, roughly +3″ and +7″ over the current ES respectively, and +5″ and +9″ over the Camry. A big increase in size, but if there was any concern about overlap with the Crown overlap, that makes the new ES firmly larger (by +4″ and +6″).
It’s possible that our version could skip the capacitative buttons, Chinese Camrys offer a similar row of capacitative center stack buttons while ours does not, but at the same time seems more likely our version will have them too.
BMW is now officially off the hook for any design crimes committed in the last decade.
The rose gold color is beautiful.
Other than that, this thing is a downgrade from previous generations.
What would you say the peak ES was? I don’t like the current generation design.
Not sure if Saul agrees, but I personally put the peak at 2007-2012
I should’ve specified- in terms of looks, this is a downgrade and my least favorite out of all of all generations. Other aspects like the longevity of the powertrain and such are yet to be seen.
In terms of looks, the 2007-2012 is indeed my favorite, closely followed by the second gen.
It has to be the second-generation, right? you still see them everywhere around here in SWFL.
The current car may not have been visually exciting, and the spindle grille was hit or miss for many (I thought it worked on certain trims, like the Ultra Luxury), but I don’t think it’s nearly as offensive as this thing is. I’d take a toned down current gen car over this any day, and twice on Sunday with the V6.
As far as peak ES – I’d say either the 91-96 and 96-01 that were rebadged Toyota Windoms, or the 09-12 facelift of the fifth gen car.
It is, but it doesn’t trump Soul Red Crystal.
Rose gold is for women’s accessories… which makes is a very good color for Lexus vehicles…
It didn’t strike me as rose gold, it looks more copper to me.
Lexus does call this color Copper Crest. I have seen this color (or something extremely similar) on one of Lexus’ newer crossovers. It’s more vibrant and pink/rose in direct sun.
Lexus’ own Infrared is equally as stunning. I got tons of comments on it when I had my IS.
That interior. Sigh. Other companies are learning that physical buttons are better… but Lexus decides to jump on the screen/ haptic wagon. Deal killer for me.
We ‘lucked’ into an X5 rental on our last business trip.
Trying to adjust the HVAC fan speed whilst driving through the touchscreen was awful. Every bounce along the road made me click something else – and the amount of attention it took from driving was terrifying that I resorted to waiting until we stopped to get food to adjust it.
We left wondering who pays a premium for that.
Am I the only one that thinks the beak looks somewhat close to the new Tesla Y with the full light bar across the front? Also I have always hated the steering wheel with the giant airbag just plopped in the middle of it. Such an awkward looking thing
It’s so awkward looking. It’s like a caveman forehead.
That looks like someone told them to make a Toyota Crown sedan using origami.
At least the front doesn’t look like a baleen whale mouth which is an improvement.
Lines and creases just for the sake of lines and creases
Someone put a mask on the typical Lexus gaping maul.
I can just imagine a T-shirt with a Toyota logo with a bunch of forks getting busy like Vermont and New Hampshire…
Now I wanna see a vinyl wrap that gives it the predator mouth.
Not quite as homely as the Toyota Busy Forks, but it’s trying. All sorts of creases and indentations, plus the standard Lexus electric-razor nose shorn of its shiny bars, don’t add up to good design. The interior is pretty awful as well, looking generic and, thanks to that wide, flat center console, cramped.
No, thanks.
I see those capacitive buttons in the photo. I don’t think you can call it driver-focused when the design makes it more difficult for the driver to focus on the road.
I guess this will make me sound like the stereotypical curmudgeon, but most new cars don’t look great, including this one. Too many cars have generic economy car proportions like a jellybean shape, tall hood & trunk (as in how much metal is actually directly above the top of the wheel arches), and large overhangs. This has all of those plus weird bits of black trim randomly strewn about and it just seems to look like a cyberpunk econo-car, I wouldn’t say it’s an ugly car. My biggest problem is it just doesn’t give me luxury or expensive car vibes. I didn’t like the last gen ES either, but at least it looked a lot more expensive and did a way better job hiding it’s Camry roots.
I agree with all of that, and will add that Lexus seems not to know who their customer is. ES buyers want a traditional, reliable, comfortable upscale sedan to take their bridge partners to the early bird special in. They do not want to look like they just escaped from an AI-generated cyberpunk cartoon.
This is Toyota gaslighting. I’m not going to question my own sanity here, it’s fugly.
It looks like a hastily re-bumpered Camry with a Kia-esque black zigzag line of…whatever the hell that adornment is supposed to be. The interior is Tesla-spartan and as far as I can tell appears to have a bunch of capacitive buttons.
This is a steaming pile of butt, design wise. Another mass of pointless angles, humps, bumps, shapes and lines that just don’t work together. My eyes don’t even know where to focus on this thing.
It may be different from previous ES’s, but I would argue not really from anything else. Others have been building cars to accept gas or electric powertrains for years. It’s obviously a thinly disguised Camry, as ES’s always have been. There’s nothing radical about it.
Steaming pile of butt, seconded!
Not to disagree, but just to point out that even with meh numbers on range and performance and “questionable” design choices, Lexus will sell these by the literal boatload.
The ES has always been in a weird place for me. It’s a nicer Camry with questionable style changes. And I see tons of them on the road. It’s a money printing factory for Lexus.
Do people really like those huge, high center consoles? I get that it can be an armrest, but it subtracts enormously from the ‘spaciousness’ of the interior.
No – We don’t.
They just become repositories for all kinds of junk and dirt and garbage.
And with EVs – There’s no need for a tunnel at all, so why even have a space-wasting console?
Just put the drive selector on a column, a pull out cupholder from the lower dash and a phone mount in the upper dash. In lieu of the console, a split bench seat where a 6th person can sit in a pinch, but otherwise the central space can be used to hold Mom’s purse, Dad’s gym bag, your to-go from Panera, etc – and if you’re really feeling the need, the seatback can fold down as an armrest with a cubby inside for anything you want to not throw away and rummage through periodically for years, and a little drawer can pull out from the seat bottom for even larger cupholders and your stash of useless dreck.
See also: mail slot trunk, peephole rear windshield, squashed backseat headroom. This car has what everybody wants in a full size sedan!
Once again, Toyota foists upon us a future that is hideous.
The Chinese offer more elegant vehicles now.
BTW Matt – The word you’re looking for is spelled “Teutonic”
Thanks, I didn’t expect to be writing about this in the morning and put it up without an edit. I’m sure David would never let that pass!