It took three generations and 23 years, but now the Lexus GX, in essence the upmarket luxury derivative of the venerable Toyota Land Cruiser Prado, is available locally. This begs the question: Why did it take so long to introduce this sure-fire winner for Lexus here?
Well, with the Land Cruiser Prado not available in the United States (only the smaller, initially Hilux-based Toyota 4Runner was), the GX was developed from the Prado to fill the gap in the US market between the mid-range unibody RX and the full-sized LX.
Introduced in 2002, the GX was thus only produced in left-hand drive form, and as such was not even available in Japan. It proved highly popular in the US, with some models achieving impressive numbers, such as the 2005 GX 470, which sold over 34,000 units.
This success prompted Lexus to introduce the GX in China as well, and the second-generation GX 460 debuted at the 2009 Guangzhou International Automobile Exhibition.
However, following continued requests from Lexus representatives in right-hand drive countries, the third generation GX was developed as a right-hand drive model as well, and revealed in prototype form in June 2023, ahead of its J250 Land Cruiser Prado sibling.
Report by FERDI DE VOS | Images © LEXUS
