2025 Toyota 4Runner

Change can be good, bad – or just scary.

Toyota’s 4Runner just got changed.

It’s no longer available with the 4.0 liter V6 that used to come standard, but it now comes standard with a turbocharged four that’s stronger than the previously standard V6 and uses less gas. It also comes standard with a 6,000 lb. tow rating; that’s 1,000 lbs. higher than the previous V6 4Runner’s max. There’s a new optional engine, too – something the 4Runner didn’t used to offer and it’s by far the strongest engine yet offered in this popular SUV.

So what’s scary about that?

Mostly, the future – which is unknowable until we get there. Whereas we know the past was very good.

What It Is

The 4Runner is a mid-sized, body-on-frame SUV (not a crossover) that is closely related to the Tacoma pickup. In fact, the 4Runner can accurately be described as a Tacoma with its bed enclosed; it is designed to carry as many seven people in up to three rows; the Taco has just two rows and a bed – for carrying stuff rather than people.

Base price – for the 2WD SR5 trim – is $41,270; adding the optional 4WD system bumps the price tag up to $43,270.

There are also multiple TRD variations, beginning with the $47,750 TRD Sport, which gets 20 inch wheels. heated seats and a fully digital main gauge panel. Adding 4WD bumps up the MSRP to $49,750. The TRD Off Road – $49,690 – features 18 inch wheels with all-terrain tires, Bilstein shocks, underbody skid plates and Multi-terrain/Crawl Control driving modes.

4WD is standard.

There are also TRD Sport Premium ($53,110) and TRD Off Road Premium ($55,470) trims that add various luxury amenities, including a 14 speaker JBL audio system, synthetic leather upholstery, a portable Bluetooth speaker and hands-free liftgate.

Beyond that, there is the $55,900 Limited trim, which gets real leather upholstery, its own unique set of 20 inch wheels and a sunroof, among other upgrades. One step higher – $63,3360 – can get you into a Platinum with premium leather upholstery, heated second row seats, Heads Up Display for the driver and smartphone key capability.

Topping the line up are the Trailhunter and TRD Pro trims – both stickering for $67,400. Both come standard with 4WD and additional off-road equipment, including a disconnecting front sway bar (to allow for greater independent wheel articulation), high-mount air snorkel (to protect against water being sucked into the engine while fording creeks and so on), wider fender flares, fog lights and auxiliary equipment switches pre-wired. The Trailhunter comes with bronze-finished wheels, frame-mounted rock sliders, Emu off-road shocks, an ARB roof rack and a built-in air compressor.

What’s New For 2025

The 4Runner gets a major makeover for the new model year. In addition to the new standard and optional drivetrains, the ’25 4Runner features a revised interior with updated tech features, including available voice-control for some of the vehicles functions.

The exterior also gets tweaked but you have to look closely to see the changes here.

What’s Good

Body-on-frame construction (which makes this SUV tough and harder to hurt as well as less expensive to repair; more about this follows) hasn’t been changed.

New standard turbo four makes more horsepower and a lot more torque than the previously standard V6; optional turbo-hybrid four makes even more.

4Runner’s rugged good looks have not been retained.

What’s Not So Good

New turbo fours are an unknown factor; they may prove to be as durable and reliable as the known-reliable and durable V6 you can’t get anymore. But only time will tell.

You can’t get the optional third row with the turbo-hybrid four; probably because the hybrid part of the drivetrain uses up the space back there.

Too many menus/inputs on the screen. A simple left-right tuning knob to change radio stations would have been better.

Under The Hood

For the past 14 years, the 4Runner came standard with Toyota’s well-regarded 4.0 liter V6. It is well-regarded because of its long-established track record. It has proved to be the kind of long-haul engine many people want because an engine that goes 250,000 miles or more before it needs major repairs means being able to drive the vehicle it’s in for as long as it takes to rack up a quarter-million-plus miles, which is typically 15-20 years or even longer than that.

The V6 was thirsty, though.

Last year, a 4Runner so equipped touted 16 city, 19 highway. That’s actually not terrible for a real-deal (body-on-frame) 4WD SUV. But it is a problem – for Toyota. Federal fuel efficiency regs punish Toyota (and other brands) for having the audacity to build vehicles and offer engines that people want rather than what the government demands. And the government demands ever-high gas mileage and ever-lower “emissions” of the gas (C02)  that does not cause or worsen pollution. Large V6s “emit” more C02 than small fours and there’s not much that can be done about that – other than replaced large V6s with small fours, which is what’s happened here.

The good news is the new 2.4 liter four is stronger than the old 4.0 liter V6, which made 270 horsepower and 278 ft.-lbs. of torque. On boost, the much smaller four summons 278 horsepower and 317 ft.-lbs. of torque, enough to bump up the ’25 4Runner’s standard towing capacity to 6,000 lbs. (up from 5,000 lbs. previously). There is also a significant uptick in gas mileage.

The new 4Runner touts 20 city, 26 highway. That’s very good for a real-deal (body-on-frame) and real 4WD SUV that weighs 4,685 lbs.

There is also the benefit – to Toyota, in terms of regulatory compliance – of lower C02 “emissions,” because the smaller engine has two fewer cylinders and so “emits” a lesser volume of gasses at the tailpipe. At least, when it is not under boost. This latter is an interesting end-run around compliance pressure. The government is trying to force the vehicle manufacturers, via regulatory compliance pressure, to make ever-smaller engines (with the end goal being to get rid of engines altogether) and the manufacturers have responded by putting smaller engines in vehicles like the 4Runner that used to come standard with larger ones. These smaller engines have had turbos bolted to them, to make them bigger-on-demand, in the sense of flowing more air (and fuel) and making power equivalent to or even higher than the bigger engines that were force-retired.

Everyone’s happy.

Well, probably not the government, which probably seethes with resentment that Toyota, et al  have figured out a way to be compliant while still offering the attributes – power and performance – that most buyers want and expect.

There’s more, too. For the first time, the 4Runner is available with an optional engine. Technically, it is the same 2.4 liter turbocharged engine. But it has been further boosted with the addition of a hybrid side that further helps with compliance (even better gas mileage and even lower “emissions” of the gas that doesn’t cause pollution) while also offering those in search of more power and performance both of those things, too.

The available turbo-hybrid drivetrain touts 326 horsepower and 465 ft.-lbs. of torque. Both of those numbers are good numbers for a V8 twice the physical size of the 2.4 liter four. Impressively, the huge increase in power does not come standard with lower gas mileage. Equipped with the turbo-hybrid set-up, a 4Runner touts 23 city, 24 highway.

However, towing capacity remains set at 6,000 lbs.

All 4Runners equipped with the optional turbo-hybrid drivetrain come standard with 4WD (real 4WD, with 2WD, 4WD High and 4WD Low range). 4WD is optional with the standard 2.4 liter turbo-only engine.

With either engine, an eight speed automatic is the standard transmission.

On The Road

Despite the loss of almost half its engine, the 4Runner hasn’t lost a step. Equipped with the now-standard 2.4 liter turbo engine, 0-60 takes about the same 7.4 seconds. But you go farther in between fill-ups. The ’25 4Runner with the 2.4 turbo engine can take you 361 miles in city driving and 475 miles on the highway; last year’s V6-powered 4Runner went 368 miles in the cirty and 437 miles on the highway. That difference is more than it appears, too – because the ’25 4Runner has a smaller (19 gallon) tank vs. the 23 gallon tank that last year’s 4Runner had. If Toyota had kept the tank size the same for 2025, the new 4Runner would have been able to take you almost 100 miles farther. It’s shame Toyota didn’t keep the tank size the same, for just exactly that reason.

The tested-out turbo-hybrid’s range is 437 miles in city driving and 475 miles on the highway. It’s also gained a step vs. last year’s V6-powered 4Runner. This version of the new 4Runner can get to 60 in about 6.7 seconds, a noticeable improvement. The old 4Runner was a horse – a Clydesdale of a horse – but it also ran like one. This one runs a bit more like a horse that can giddyap and also pull the Budweiser wagon.

Some of the reviews you’ll read will complain about how the 4Runner rides – because it rides like a real-deal (body-on-frame) SUV that is capable of going seriously off-road rather than a unibody crossover that looks like it can go off-road. If you like the ride and feel of a real SUV, you will like what Toyota hasn’t done to the 4Runner (i.e., turn it into another light-duty crossover that looks like an SUV).

This rig feels heavy because it is – and that feels good.

It is also the right size for actually going off-roading. It’s not too wide (important when threading the needle on a narrow trail with trees on either side and little room to spare on either side) and on-road, you don’t feel as though you’re driving a kind of four-wheel-drive Queen Mary. One particularly excellent thing Toyota did was to retain grab-’em control knobs (big ones) for the climate controls and also to adjust the volume of the stereo (there’s an additional redundant push-button control for that on the steering wheel). One unfortunate thing Toyota did not do was to include a knob like that to allow for easy, left-right turn-tuning of the FM/SiriusXM channels. You have to use the big LCD screen and tap/swipe menus interface. Or use the voice-activation interface, if you prefer.

For such a capable vehicle, the 4Runner is a great everyday vehicle. It is not too big (and not too small) as well as comfortable and confident-feeling to be in.

At The Curb

It doesn’t look like much has changed. The changes to the exterior are slight, which is good because why change what people obviously like?

Mild tweaks to the front and rear ends. Nothing to fix what ain’t broke. Rugged – but not cod piece macho. Functionally rugged. The headlights down’t protrude and so are less vulnerable to being damaged. The grill is not a huge catfish mouth with a massive (and fragile) plastic grille. It’s also recessed so )again) less likely to be broken by just slightly bumping into something. Lots of clearance in the wheelwells – so the tires are less likely to scrub when you hit a big dip. Molded-in fender flares to help control the mud splash. Good visibility in eery direction other than the rear – if you have the optional third row, because the headrests block about 10 percent of the view on either side. These can, however, be easily removed and if you haven’t got the third row, it’s no problem to begin with.

As mentioned earlier, the just-right size of the 4Runner is very appealing if you’re someone who needs something that’s not too-small but doesn’t want something that’s too big. There’s ample room for four; enough room for five and room for seven if two of them are kids or young teenagers.

The ’25 is a little longer than the ’24: 194.9 inches vs. 190.2 previously. Curiously, the base SR5 sits a little lower this year – 8.1 inches of ground clearance vs. 9 previously. TRD Pro and Trailhunter versions have 10.1 inches of ground clearance.

An interesting tidbit is that the third row is not available with the hybrid drivetrain – which gives you an idea about the space taken up by the hybrid drivetrain. The 1.87 kilowatt-hour battery pack and electric motor mount under the floorpans made the third row untenable, apparently.

Cargo space behind the second row is 48.4 cubic feet; drop them and the total space opens up to 90.2 cubic feet.

The Rest

Once again, there’s this weird up-selling of the hybrid drivetrain, which is only available with the Limited, Platinum, TRD Pro and Trailhunter trims. This means the least expensive version of the 4Runner with the hybrid drivetrain is the $52,490 TRD Pro. That’s an $11,220 bump to get the hybrid drivetrain. You get more power, obviously – but the upselling is proof that “saving on gas” is not the primary reason for the hybridizing.

It is compliance.

Last thing – about the body on frame thing. It’s a good thing, because you can unbolt many of the exterior panels if they need to replaced – as opposed to having to cut them off and weld new panels in place.

The Bottom Line

On paper, the new 4Runner is stronger than ever. Whether it is better is something we won’t know until the future plays out – and that’ll take some time.

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