Honda Spills Beans on Future Product, Shows Civic Hybrid

Matthew Guy
by Matthew Guy

Looking ahead to the 2024 calendar year, Honda has laid out some of its plans for the forthcoming 12 months. While we’re sure they’ve still a few things up their sleeve (after all, the phrase “We can’t comment on future product” is a PR mainstay), the news does give us a good idea as to what’s in store – plus a shot of the 2025 Civic Hybrid.

Let’s start with that model, a trim which is sure to pad sales numbers in Honda showrooms as it continues its long-running battle with the Toyota Corolla, a car which has been offering hybrid power for some spell. Right off the bat, Honda is expecting big things from the Civic Hybrid, stating they feel the trim will comprise a full 40 percent of the models' sales when it launches this summer. 


For all you number nerds (*raises hand*), Honda shifted 200,381 new Civics in America last year, meaning they’ll need to sell about 80,000 of the things to meet their goal. In comparison, Toyota sold 232,370 Corollas - not counting the Cross - through calendar year 2023, of which 47,990 were hybrids. That’s just over 20 percent.


It is certainly possible that Honda will build to this target of 40 percent and force demand; after all, Civics tend to sell no matter what’s on the ground. Also, the hybrid powertrain is promised in both sedan and hatchback body styles, so that’ll help. We’ll be sure to keep an eye on this metric as the calendar flips through 2024. The entire Civic lineup gets styling tweaks for the ’25 model year, presumably like the ones shown in that hero shot above.

Elsewhere in the showroom, the Prologue is scheduled to land in the coming months, the Odyssey minivan is due for some tweaks, and a fuel cell CR-V is in the works for certain markets. Acura customers will find freshened MDX and RDX crossovers whilst shopping, along with the ZDX variant of that Prologue EV. 


Buried in the bumf is a line saying that a new Acura crossover will also debut later this year, positioned at the lineup’s gateway alongside the Integra. Any bets they’ll call it the IDX? Unless, of course, VW’s bloodthirsty yet bedwetting lawyers cry foul, in which case it may be called the ADX.


[Images: Honda]


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Matthew Guy
Matthew Guy

Matthew buys, sells, fixes, & races cars. As a human index of auto & auction knowledge, he is fond of making money and offering loud opinions.

More by Matthew Guy

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  • Jalop1991 Jalop1991 on Jan 18, 2024

    Does Honda have the software team all ready to re-do the firmware so it disables the battery to save on warranty costs?


    Ford is anxiously awaiting the answer to that.

  • RHD RHD on Jan 21, 2024

    A hybrid with a 6-speed manual. Now we're talking!

  • Kwik_Shift_Pro4X The dominoes start to fall...
  • IBx1 Get the standard established, then stop building the chargers while you let others license the design from you to build more stations with your standard disgusting
  • IBx1 “Dare to live more”-company that went from making the Countach and Diablo to an Audi crossover with an Audi engine and only pathetic automatic garabge ”live mas”-taco bell
  • Pianoboy57 Not buying one of these new when I was a young guy was a big regret. I hated the job I had then so didn't want to commit to payments. I did own a '74 Corona SR later for a short time.
  • FreedMike This wasn’t unpredictable. Despite what the eV HaTerZ kLuBB would like you to believe, EV sales are still going up, just not as quickly as they had been, but Tesla’s market share is down dramatically. That’s the result of what I’ve been saying for a long time: that the competition would eventually start catching up, and that’s exactly what’s happening. How did this happen? It boils down to this: we’re not back in 2019 anymore. Back then, if you wanted an EV that wasn’t a dorky looking ecomobile like a Leaf or Bolt, it was pretty much Tesla or bust, and buyers had to deal with all the endemic Tesla issues (build quality problems, bizarre ergonomics, weird styling, and so forth). That’s not the case today – there is a ton of competition, and while these newer models aren’t quite there when it comes to EV tech, they’re getting closer, and most of the Tesla weirdness just doesn’t apply. And then there’s this: stale product is the kiss of death in the car biz, and aside from the vanity project known as Cybertruck, all of Tesla’s stuff is old now. It’s not as “bleeding edge” as it used to be. For a company that made its’ bones on being on the forefront of tech, that’s a big problem.I don’t think Tesla is out of the game – not by a long shot. They’re still the market leader by a very wide margin, and their EV tech is the best in the game. But they need to stop focusing on stuff like the Cybertruck (technically fascinating, but it’s clearly an Elon Musk ego trip), the money/talent suck that is FSD, and the whole robotaxi thing, and put product first. At a minimum, everything they sell needs a very heavy refresh, and the entry level EV is a must.
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