Nissan's GT-R Successor Will Be Electrified

The car could be a hybrid or an EV, but do not expect it to come any time soon.

The Nissan GT-R has been on the market for a long time. The car unveiled all the way back in 2007 is still going strong in its third decade, so it’s fair to think a replacement is around the corner. A replacement is apparently on its way, but get ready to wait a very long time.

In a conversation with Autocar, Nissan CEO Takao Katagiri confirms a new, unnamed flagship Nissan performance car is on the way. He says the new product will be “under the Nismo brand,” with both a hybrid and an EV. Notably, he adds that the car will also be available in Europe, where the current GT-R has been dropped and the new Z is not going to be sold. There is no timeline, but the story notes that Katagiri hinted the car would arrive this decade.

As it is 2022, that leaves a window of eight full years for Nissan to actually produce a successor to its current GT-R. For most brands, that is a full generation of a flagship performance car.

Other than that, details are unclear. Autocar speculates that the GT-R successor will be tied to Nissan’s plans for solid-state batteries, noting previous conversations about the brand’s focus on EV performance being built around the future technology. They claim a previous discussion with another Nissan executive suggested an all-electric performance car could be coming shortly after the car introduces production cars with solid-state tech, something the brand currently targets for 2028. That would put the announcement of an all-electric GT-R successor closer to 2029 or 2030, although the company could just as easily produce a more traditional EV and/or hybrid sports car much sooner to stay competitive. After all, competitors like Porsche are already testing production-ready EV sports cars.