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On August 16, among the many traditional automakers developing electric vehicles, JapanToyotaIt may be the slowest, but it may also become the first automaker to abandon pure gasoline power.

Two Toyota executives revealed that before launching the oil-electricHybridNearly 30 years after the Prius, Toyota is planning to convert most, and possibly all, of its Toyota and Lexus models to hybrids.Power cartype.

Toyota continues to challenge the prevailing view among the auto industry and regulators that the future of cars will be all electric by focusing on hybrids rather than pure electric vehicles.

Toyota Motor Chairman Akio Toyoda said in January that he believed global pure electric vehicle market share could reach as high as 30%. Toyota, by contrast, is promoting a "multi-path" strategy that includes pure electric vehicles, hybrids, hydrogen fuel cell vehicles, green fuels and possibly other technologies that have yet to emerge.

Toyota will conduct the evaluation as each model is redesigned, and may even start in advance.

That includes a major update coming for the 2026 RAV4, the best-selling SUV in the U.S., where hybrid versions already account for about half of sales.

Two people familiar with Toyota's product planning said Toyota is likely to drop the gasoline-only version of the model for the North American market, but no final decision has been made.

Toyota has stopped offering the gasoline-only Camry, its best-selling sedan in the U.S., for the 2025 model year, and the rugged Land Cruiser SUV and Sienna MPV are now hybrid-only.

Many of the hybrid-only models may also be equipped with larger batteries in the future to become plug-in hybrids, according to two people who asked not to be identified discussing private matters.

There have been no previous reports that Toyota plans to convert all or almost all of its North American models to hybrids.

New emissions regulations

Toyota's hybrid strategy is aimed at cementing its dominance in a market that is seeing a resurgence as demand for electric vehicles slows due to high prices and charging issues.

Toyota's hybrid vehicles do not need to be charged and can seamlessly switch between gasoline and electric power, or use both at the same time, depending on driving conditions. Toyota's plug-in hybrid vehicles can be charged and typically travel about 40 miles (64 kilometers) in pure electric mode before needing to use the gasoline engine.

In addition to the two on saleElectric VehiclesWith the exception of the 2011 Toyota and Lexus EV and a fuel cell vehicle, eight of the 31 other Toyota and Lexus models in North America are now hybrid-only and another eight are gasoline-only.

Toyota executives and industry experts say the hybrid strategy will also give Toyota a unique advantage in complying with increasingly stringent U.S. carbon emissions regulations.

As the United States tightens emissions standards under rules enacted in March, Toyota's booming hybrid sales could help the company save billions of dollars in regulatory fines and costs while buying it more time to develop electric or other zero-emission vehicles.

The new emissions standards will take effect starting with the 2027 model year and will last until 2032.

Christ said Toyota has not set a deadline for hybridization of all its models, and some models such as pickup trucks and economy cars may take longer because consumers of entry-level models are more price sensitive.

In addition to hybrid vehicles, Toyota plans to convert about 30% of its global models to pure electric vehicles by 2030, mainly launching a small number of all-electric models based on existing best-selling models, according to two sources familiar with Toyota's product planning.

Toyota has previously announced plans to invest $35 billion in the development of new battery technology and electric vehicle platforms by 2030.

In May, Toyota showed off a prototype of a small internal combustion engine that it said could one day run on biofuels or low-carbon synthetic gasoline and be paired with a hybrid drivetrain.

But the main purpose of downsizing the engine is to allow Toyota to develop hybrid vehicles in a different way, according to a source familiar with Toyota's product planning. Toyota plans to add smaller engines starting with its new electric vehicle platform, allowing it to develop more efficient hybrid options.

The first hybrid model based on the new platform and new engine may be the Corolla plug-in hybrid, which is expected to be launched in China in 2026 and in the United States in 2027, the source revealed.

Turning Point

Toyota's continued investment over the years in reducing costs and improving the efficiency and performance of its gasoline-electric hybrid powertrains has enabled its hybrid vehicle business to flourish.

For most Toyota models, opting for hybrid power is a given, as today's hybrid technology typically adds less than $2,000 to the retail price of a vehicle.

And while early hybrids were slower, today's models are often more powerful than their gasoline-only versions.

Those advances have eliminated two major concerns that consumers had about hybrids for years, which have kept them a niche segment of the auto market, accounting for less than 3% of U.S. sales as recently as 2019. Now, that share is 11.3% and growing rapidly, according to Cox Automotive, a specialist in automotive services.

The growth has been even more dramatic because of Toyota's dominance in the hybrid segment, which has brought the company to a tipping point that has executives now considering an all-hybrid model lineup. Hybrids accounted for just 9% of Toyota's sales in 2018, but that has grown to 37% through June.

Surging sales of hybrid vehicles have also been a key factor in driving the company's profits and stock prices to record highs this year.

Christ said Toyota expects hybrid sales to continue to accelerate. "Next year," he said, "we will certainly be well over 50 percent hybrid in our total sales."

Toyota said its U.S. hybrid vehicle sales surged 66% to 438,845 units in the year ended June 30 compared with the same period last year, while sales of all-electric vehicles were just 15,107.

Atlanta-based Cox Automotive estimates that demand growth for all-electric vehicles is likely to remain modest over the next few years.

"Growth in electric vehicles will continue, but it won't be as rapid as it has been in the past few years," said Stephanie Valdez Streaty, a senior analyst at Cox.

"At the same time, conventional gasoline-electric hybrids and plug-in hybrids will continue to erode EVs' market share because they are more accessible and familiar to consumers and do not have range anxiety."

Gaining time

Toyota plans to launch more plug-in hybrid vehicles to take advantage of U.S. emissions regulations that give them greater credit for reducing pollution. This is now possible because Toyota has opened a battery factory in North Carolina that will have 14 production lines by 2030 and can produce 30 gigawatt hours (GWh) of batteries per year.

So far, sales of plug-in hybrids have lagged far behind conventional hybrids due to their higher costs: Toyota's current plug-in hybrid models are typically $5,000 or $6,000 more expensive than their gasoline counterparts.

Katsuhiko Hirose, a former Toyota manager who oversaw global powertrain planning, said mainstream hybrids would buy Toyota valuable time to develop electric vehicles and other next-generation technologies.

Katsuhiko Hirose, now a visiting professor and energy consultant at Kyushu University in Japan, estimates that the new U.S. rules would essentially require Toyota to convert nearly all of its models to hybrids by around 2030, while increasing the proportion of plug-in hybrids, to avoid regulatory fines or other costs.

"Hybrids will buy Toyota more time and give it more flexibility in terms of how quickly and how many electric vehicles it launches," Hirose said. "They won't feel forced to produce electric vehicles."