The Lexus ES was already subtly slinky for a mainstream luxury sedan—now it's unabashedly bold
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00:00This is the 2026 Lexus ES. This is Lexus's mid-size luxury sedan. It's all new, and for the first time, it's offered as a dual powertrain vehicle. This means you can get in both hybrid and all electric. It's inspired by this. You can tell there's quite a bit of difference here, but this concept is wild.
00:27I mean, it's got cameras for mirrors, has this very pointy front end, really extreme rake going on with basically the whole profile.
00:37So how does this translate over to the ES, which a lot of people maybe associate with sort of stuffy country club luxury?
00:44The ES was already sort of a subtly sexy car. It was growing more and more attractive over the years. It was long, low, and wide.
00:51The big difference is that it's quite a bit taller, so that's, again, to make room for those batteries in the electric versions.
00:58But a lot of the style that we saw in that concept is translating here.
01:03There's pointy lighting, these extreme kind of intake-looking elements.
01:09You have a lot of these chamfering going on on the hood.
01:12Things soften up as you get to the back, but it's still generally a pretty clean, attractive car, and it's, again, very much a sedan.
01:21It's low. There's a trunk lid back there. It's not a hatch, even though the rake of the backlight is pretty extreme.
01:27And you have, just like on some other modern Lexuses, these pull-button door handles that really just kind of disappear into the body sides.
01:37They translated some of the extreme surfacing of the concept into this zigzaggy body line.
01:44Probably the wildest element of the styling just in the profile, which is otherwise, again, very clean, very attractive.
01:50And on this one, which is all electric, grill-less.
01:56Let's hop on the interior, because while the outside is plainly luxurious, we're going to get in there and see just how sumptuous the interior is.
02:08So, another big change with the ES, if you're used to Lexus interiors having a lot of wood and some other things like that, there isn't really any here, right?
02:16Like, it looks like a really modern interior, almost Tesla-like, especially with the way they've switched to this Lexus script on the steering wheel.
02:24You've got the big tablet display.
02:26It looks minimalist. You know, that's clearly what they were going for, and I'll admit that looking at it in photos, it almost looked plain.
02:34Sitting in it, however, is a lot different.
02:36These materials, if you're used to a Tesla interior, they'll blow you away.
02:40If you're used to a Lexus, they'll meet your expectations.
02:43This is very, very soft-touch. Everything is really, really nice.
02:48Most surprisingly, this sort of touch-sensitive panel that runs almost the width of the dashboard has this nice, like, squeegee, rubberized effect to it.
02:57I mean, even just touching it, knowing it's touch-sensitive, normally that's, like, piano black or something hard and cold.
03:04It's pretty warm.
03:05And you've got dual phone chargers right here, this new little electronic shifter.
03:10It's laid-back, it's minimalist, but everything feels really, really nice.
03:16I mean, Lexus even put this fuzzy carpeted material surrounding the gauge display.
03:21I mean, it's in a place that you're never going to touch for any good reason, but it feels great.
03:26The lighting effects are very cool, though.
03:28And this is something, again, if you just looked in photos, you might not spot this.
03:32Power up the car, and you have wild lines on the door panel here.
03:37The speaker is lighting up.
03:39Seats are super comfortable.
03:41And, you know, we talked about on the exterior how tall this car is.
03:45It works.
03:46There's headroom.
03:47There's headroom here.
03:48Even though there's a sense that if you've maybe been in a previous ES, the floor's higher up.
03:53You know, the seats are a little higher up.
03:55The roof is higher up.
03:56So there's plenty of room.
03:57And we've sat in the back, plenty of space back there.
04:00Tons of legroom, tons of headroom.
04:02It's just a really, really nice place to spend some time.
04:05So, bravo, Lexus.
04:07This looks cool, looks techie.
04:08If you're looking at an EV, you want some of this style, maybe.
04:12But they made it as Lexus as they could probably make it.
04:17For this model, this is the dual-motor EV.
04:20It's called the ES500E.
04:22You have a front electric motor, rear electric motor, delivering 338 horsepower, 250 miles of range.
04:31But if you give up that rear motor, you get 221 horsepower.
04:35Again, only driving the front wheels.
04:37And 300 miles of range.
04:39It has a NACS port, so moving to the new charging standard.
04:44And we don't have a lot of details yet.
04:46We don't know how big the battery is.
04:48We don't really know how efficient the hybrid is going to be.
04:51But the hybrid was pretty efficient before.
04:53And we have the range estimates here.
04:56And so working backwards from some of what Lexus has given us,
04:59we have a pretty good idea that this is using a lot of the battery and motor technology
05:03that's popping up throughout the Toyota and Lexus lineups.
05:06So most specifically, it's pretty close to the 2026 Toyota BZ.
05:11So after pouring over this Lexus ES, it's clear that it's super luxurious.
05:17It is not a Tesla.
05:18It's very distinct from that, even in this all-electric form.
05:21But it is very Lexus-y.
05:23Surprising style.
05:24And we can't wait to get it out on the road and take it for a test drive.
05:28Head on over to Motortrend.com for the full story.