Toyota is expected to be one of the world’s first car manufacturers to launch a passenger vehicle powered by solid-state batteries. The company has been talking about its solid-state goals for years, but now its plans to start building cars with this battery tech have been validated by the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, and the official start of production is set for sometime in 2026.
Initial production will be very limited but it will be ramped up through 2027 and 2028, although there could still be setbacks that postpone it again. However, actual mass production is planned for “2030 and beyond,” according to a post on Toyota Times.
In a recent press release published by Toyota, the manufacturer says it will begin solid-state battery production “starting from 2026” and that this will be “gradually implemented.” With its next-generation performance battery (which will be built by two third parties for Toyota), it wants to reach an annual production target of 9 gigawatt-hours, although this combined figure will be achieved over time.
The plan is to build both the solid-state and new high-performance batteries in Japan, although it notes that it “is an equipment-intensive industry requiring large-scale investments in significant facilities. To maintain and enhance manufacturing capabilities and technologies within Japan's battery industry, which includes equipment industries and material manufacturers, government support is provided.”
These new solid-state batteries from Toyota promise much quicker charging times (flat to full in around 10 minutes) and up to 621 miles (1,000 km) of WLTP range at first, which will later be upgraded to 750 miles. The manufacturer initially announced that it was going to launch a solid-state-powered vehicle in 2020, but this never materialized, and the manufacturer said it was holding back and waiting for a breakthrough to make production feasible.
It announced a breakthrough in June of 2023, which it said increased the theoretical range provided by these batteries by 20% to over 745 miles. There were also some previous reports that Toyota’s first solid-state production car was going to be a hybrid, not a full EV. This makes sense since an EV-sized solid-state battery pack would drive up the vehicle’s cost considerably, while a hybrid’s smaller pack wouldn’t affect the vehicle’s total cost as much.
Toyota isn’t the only automaker with plans to put solid-state batteries in cars to reap all their benefits. SAIC-owned MG says it will launch its first solid-state-powered production vehicle in 2025. Another SAIC brand, IM Motor, has already revealed the L6, which has a 133 kWh semi-solid-state battery that promises to deliver a range of up to 673 on the Chinese CLTC test cycle. Charging it for just 12 minutes adds 249 miles of range.
