Toyota Hilux

The Hilux has never had anything to prove off the tarmac. It climbs mountains, wades through mud, shrugs off maintenance neglect and, as the old joke goes, will outlast you and most of your family, provided the government keeps letting a diesel pickup exist. Its capability was never the question.

The question that has always hung over it in India is a different one: when you are not halfway up a mountain or knee-deep in a trail, when it is just doing the school run or sitting in a parking garage, can you actually live with it?

Design & Build Quality

The Hilux is not just big, it is Herculean from every angle. The modernising touches are all here: LED headlamps, LED DRLs and fog lights, and a new grille that together make the face look sharper, more aggressive and more imposing than before. The alloys are new 17-inch units wrapped in fat all-terrain tyres, interestingly down from the old 18s. Personally, I prefer the smaller, chunkier look. 

The rear end is simpler, though there is no dramatic change back there; the clean look and the Toyota badge do the work. There is a side step and a new rear side step to make climbing into the bed easier, and the tailgate opens with a slow, soft-open motion.

The key thing to understand about the Hilux's road presence is that it was never about styling, it's about sheer size, and that size is fully intact. At 5,325 mm long, 1,855 mm wide and 1,815 mm tall, riding on a 3,085 mm wheelbase, it towers over almost anything it shares a road with. It is longer than the Land Rover Defender 110 and the wheelbase itself is longer than the entire MG Comet.

Design & Quality

This is where the generational leap is most obvious. The dashboard has been completely redesigned around a chunky, industrial theme. Everything is big and substantial: chunky toggle switches, proper knobs, a shift lever with real weight to it. Toyota has deliberately resisted dumping every function onto a screen, even though there is now a large 12.3-inch display. Aesthetically it is minimalist, modern and a clear step up.

On quality, it's solid rather than plush. There is a leather wrap up front, though not the soft-touch material you would find in a Fortuner. But this is a Toyota: no uneven panel gaps, everything feels robust and built to last, and the storage lids open with a satisfying, weighty smoothness. The one letdown is the hard plastics lower down, which feel a bit cheap, and overall it is not outright premium for the money, but measured against the old car, it is night and day.

Front Seats

Arguably the most important improvement of the lot, and an easy one to overlook. The previous Hilux had a strange flaw: a truck that size should have suited big occupants, yet the driving position and front passenger seat both ended up awkward. The new one fixes that. With the seat dropped to its lowest position, you get a large, supportive seat, plenty of room in the floor area, and good knee clearance from the dashboard.

The driving position is monumentally more comfortable and big-person-friendly than it has ever been. The seats are manually adjusted, with rake-and-reach steering adjustment to help find a good position.

Rear Seats

This is where the case wobbles hardest. The back seat is better than before, but only slightly, and it remains a compromise. Legroom itself is fine: a roughly 5'7"-5'8" passenger sitting behind a similar-height driver has genuinely good knee room. However, the floor is raised, so under-thigh support suffers and headroom gets tight for anyone over six feet. The biggest limitation is the backrest, which is set bolt upright with no ability to recline making longer journeys tiring.

Getting in and out is a climb, too. This is not a space your family will enjoy, it is not a reason anyone should buy a Hilux, and if your parents or family did not take to the old truck's rear seat, this one will not win them over either.

Storage & Practicality

Cabin practicality is a genuine strong suit. There are dual glove boxes, one-litre bottle holders in the doors, flip-open cup holders in front of the side AC vents, and a big storage bin under the front armrest, plus another bottle holder between the front seats.

It is a well-thought-out set of cubbies: practical is the right word, even if feature-loaded is not.

Charging Options

Up front there is a 220V socket housed within the front-armrest storage bin, handy for powering accessories.

Rear passengers get two USB Type-C charging ports. It is a basic but usable set of charging points, in keeping with the truck's no-frills brief.

Boot / Bed Space

Open the tailgate and, well, it is a bed. To put the space in relatable terms, you could fit somewhere around 20-24 cabin-sized trolley bags or six to seven full-size suitcases. It is manually lockable, opens via that slow soft-open tailgate, and the load area itself is essentially unchanged from before.

This is still a working truck underneath the lifestyle wrapper. What has changed is access: the new rear step makes climbing up to the bed noticeably easier.

The headline kit is modern and works well. The new 12.3-inch touchscreen has good usability and touch response and gets wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, though it sets no benchmarks for user experience. It's paired with a crisp colour TFT digital driver's display that's easy to use and genuinely good quality, plus steering-mounted controls. The eight-speaker sound system is decent but great. Sitting here, it finally feels like a modern car.

Then the daily-use list runs thin, and this is the recurring frustration, especially on a truck that lands around Rs 35-40 lakh on-road. You get manual air-conditioning instead of automatic climate control, which is hard to justify at this price. The inside rear-view mirror is a manual day/night unit, not auto-dimming. The seats are fabric, manually adjusted, and neither leatherette-trimmed, ventilated nor powered. There's rake-and-reach steering adjustment and one-touch power windows all round, but there's no ADAS.

Missing Features:

• Automatic Climate Control

• Auto Day/night IRVM

• Auto Headlamps/ wipers

• Powered Seats

• Leatherette Upholstery 

• Power-adjustable driver seat

• 18-inch Alloy Wheels

• Rear Disc Brakes

• Rear AC Vents

• ADAS

The safety kit covers the essentials: seven airbags, ABS with EBD, brake assist, front and rear parking sensors, Tyre Pressure Monitoring System, and a 360-degree camera.

Other electronic aids include Vehicle Stability Control, Active Traction Control, and Hill Assist and Downhill Assist Control. The notable misses are no ADAS, no auto-dimming inside mirror, and, no rear defogger.

The mechanical heart is carried over, and that is no bad thing. 

Engine

It is the same trusted, proven 2.8-litre diesel: 2,755 cc, 204 PS and 500 Nm of torque. Notably, it does not get the mild-hybrid tech Toyota introduced on the Fortuner, a slightly odd omission.

Vibrations are reasonably well controlled, though you are always aware it is a Herculean lump: the air intake is almost as prominent a sound as the engine note itself.

City Performance

In town the throttle is easy to modulate and the whole thing delivers a calm, unhurried drive. The automatic is not lightning-quick between shifts, but it is smooth enough that you never feel like you are piloting something industrial, and the gear lever has lost the old ratchety action in favour of a far more polished, premium feel.

A light nudge of the throttle and the torque simply pulls you forward, the nose lifts slightly and it surges ahead, which is genuinely good fun.

Highway Performance

It wafts along highways, picks up speed with ease, and will sit at triple-digit speeds all day without complaint, and with an 80-litre fuel tank, it has the range to keep doing so between fills.

Overtakes are effortless thanks to the wall of low-end torque.

Ride Comfort

For a city buyer this is the make-or-break area, and it is the single biggest improvement. The suspension is exactly what you would expect of a proper pickup: double wishbones up front, a leaf-spring at the rear, built to haul weight rather than cushion occupants. What Toyota has done well is take the sharpness out. Over paver blocks, small broken patches or a speed breaker taken slowly, the old truck would deliver a hard, sudden jolt. The new one smooths a good chunk of that away, with a real layer of softness now, most noticeable in the front row. Even driving solo, it no longer feels as stiff as before.

The honest caveat is that the improvement has a ceiling. Hit a bigger pothole or a genuinely sharp speed breaker and the rear axle still sends a strong kick through the cabin. A real, meaningful gain, but a relative one: from punishing to tolerable, not from tolerable to comfortable.

Handling

It is a hydraulic power steering setup, and at parking and U-turn speeds it is still heavy: you will feel the effort, and stepping in from a normal car takes five to ten minutes to acclimatise. Once you are moving, above roughly 30-40kmph, it lightens noticeably and becomes easier to place, though it never gets crossover-light. 

The bigger city challenge is the footprint. At 5,325 mm long, with a 6.4-metre turning circle, threading it through traffic or slotting it into a tight bay is a job in itself. If your parking space is shorter than five metres, you are parking elsewhere. The 360-degree camera helps here, especially for parallel parking, even if its clarity is only average.

The Toyota Hilux is available in two variants: GX and VX. They all share the same 2.8-litre mild-hybrid diesel engine paired with a 6-speed torque-converter automatic, but the GX trim also gets a 4x2 powertrain option in addition to the 4x4, which remains standard in the VX trim.

Toyota Hilux GX

• Available with 4x2 and 4x4 drivetrain options.

• Exterior gets LED headlamps, unpainted door handles, halogen taillamps, 17-inch black alloy wheels and ORVM-mounted turn indicators.

• Cabin features all-black theme with fabric seat upholstery, three-spoke steering wheel, front centre armrest, tilt and telescopic steering adjustment and steering-mounted controls.

• Basic feature list includes manual AC, electrically-adjustable ORVMs, wired Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, 8-inch touchscreen infotainment, 4-speaker sound system, 7-inch digital instrument cluster and front USB Type-C charging port.

• For safety you get 7 airbags, ABS with EBD, electronic stability control, rear view camera, manual day/night IRVM, ISOFIX child seat anchors and three-point seatbelts with reminders for all occupants.

• 4x4 variant adds a low range transfer case and electronic differential lock.

Toyota Hilux VX

• Only offered with 4x4 drivetrain

• Slightly better exterior with LED DRLs and fog lamps, wheel arch cladding, sharkfin antenna, body-coloured ORVMs, LED taillamps and sharkfin antenna.

• Cabin features a larger touchscreen and soft touch materials on the dashboard.

• Adds equipment like 12.3-inch touchscreen, wireless Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, wireless phone charger, drive modes, cruise control, 2 more USB Type-C charging ports, PM2.5 cabin air filter and connected car technology.

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• Pick the GX 4x4 variant as it gives you a lot more room to customize the truck as per your requirements. All the highlight features that are present in the VX are not exceptional and aftermarket options could prove to be better and more affordable.

So, is it better for the city? Yes, measurably. But it is an improvement in degree, not in kind.

Everything that mattered for daily use has moved in the right direction. The ride has shed its worst sharpness, the front cabin and driving position are a proper generational leap, the drivetrain is smoother and more refined, and touches like the 360 camera take the edge off living with something this large. If you already wanted a Hilux, day-to-day life with this one is genuinely kinder and more comfortable than it has ever been.

But it has not rewritten what the Hilux is. Big bumps still deliver a hard rear-axle kick, the steering is still heavy at parking speeds, the five-metre-plus body still fights you in tight spaces, the rear seat is still a compromise your family will feel, and the feature list is still thin for the money. Every compromise you had to live with before is still here, just a little less of each.

Other Options To Consider

Isuzu D-Max V-Cross

Reasons To Consider

● The most direct lifestyle-pickup rival in the Indian market

● Established off-road credentials and similar go-anywhere capability

Reasons To Ignore

● Older cabin and interior experience than the more premium Hilux

Editor's note: The Hilux, with its locking rear differential, is more capable offroad. And as per reputation, it's once again the Hilux which is lower in maintenance and more rugged. Given that it's now more modern too, paying extra for it will be worth it.