Okay everyone, act surprised.
Lexus must’ve noticed that everyone in the world ran an article on a leaked photo depicting the front-end of the next-generation ES saloon yesterday, because they woke up bright and early today to show us an “all-new” model that’s slated for debut at the Beijing International Motor Show on the 25th of April.
“The new vehicle aims to introduce a radical transformation of the concept of comfort for luxury consumers around the world.” — Lexus
Now, everyone act as if we don’t know it’s the new ES. An image published on Al Muraba showed an intricate grille that clearly takes inspiration from the LS limousine, flanked by headlights that are (unfortunately) bereft of the tri-eye design that we’ve seen from the posher Lexus models of late.
Also not carried from the LS is the tri-claw LED daytime running lights, with a more conventional setup employed here.
The latest generation ES will likely continue to share underpinnings with the large Toyota Avalon saloon, meaning the use of Toyota New Global Architecture. With the Avalon, the US-market model is offered with a 3.5-litre V6 or a 2.5-litre petrol-electric hybrid, and we’re likely to see similar setups for the ES saloon.
The ES might be similar in size to something like a BMW 5-Series, but price- and positioning-wise, it’s more of a 3-Series competitor. As such, it sits alongside the smaller Lexus IS saloon, which outsold it nearly six-fold through last year on our shores. However, it fares far better in North America, where the ES was responsible for something like 17% of total sales for Lexus.
*Current-generation Lexus ES
There’s reason to believe that while it’s positioned as an ‘inferior’ version of the Lexus GS, the narrowed gap in appeal between the ES and the GS means that the ES may go on to replace the GS in this generation, though that remains as mere speculation at the time of writing.
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