New Lotus SUV to be revealed this year and it has the Porsche Macan in its crosshairs

Lotus has confirmed it will reveal its long-awaited challenger to the Porsche Macan before the end of the year, and it will be the first model to feature the British firm’s critical new ‘Hyper Hybrid’ technology.

Lotus CEO Feng Qingfeng shared the news during the company’s Q2 financial results call, confirming that the as-yet-unnamed model being revealed soon is an SUV. He added that it will be launched in China first in early 2026 before reaching Europe and other markets shortly after.

Lotus announced its intention to launch a mid-size SUV, known internally as the ‘Type 134’, back in 2021. At that point it was going to be pure-electric, like the latest Macan, but since then the plan for Lotus to go EV only by 2028 has been scrapped and the company is now working quickly to add hybrid power to its cars to try and boost customer appeal.

Lotus is having a rough year, to put it mildly. The British sports car maker just recorded a net loss of over £230million in the first half of 2025, sales are about half what they were at this point last year and it will soon be cutting 550 people from its UK workforce. 

The huge, ever-growing popularity of mid-size SUVs should give Lotus some hope for the future because it means this new offering has the potential to significantly boost its sales figures. For context, the brand has delivered just 2,813 new cars so far in 2025, down from 4,904 in the same period last year. 

It’s also worth remembering that Lotus’ factory in Wuhan, China, where it produces the all-electric Emeya four-door GT and Eletre flagship SUV – which are both available to order and to lease now through our Buy A Car service – has a 150,000-unit capacity. In 2024, Lotus sold less than 7,000 examples of its two ‘lifestyle EVs’.

The British brand’s Porsche Macan and BMW X3 rival was supposed to be revealed last year, and last we heard the brand was targeting a starting price of around $70,000 (£55,000). That would put it within a few thousand pounds of the BMW, and significantly undercut the Macan Electric, which starts from over £68k. Whether or not this is still the goal remains to be seen.

What do we know about Lotus’s Hyper Hybrid technology?

By 2028, every model in the Lotus range will feature hybrid technology. That includes the Emira mid-engined sports car, which we’ve just learned will be available with plug-in hybrid power from 2027. 

As we mentioned, this SUV will be the first model to use Lotus’s Hyper Hybrid technology. It should make its way into the existing Eletre and Emeya next year too, and will be used by another mysterious model codenamed ‘Vision X’, which Lotus says it will also unveil in 2027.

While key technical details remain under wraps for now, bosses at Lotus have previously told Auto Express the ‘Hyper Hybrid’ set-up will offer an “EV-centric driving experience”, more than 100 miles of zero-emissions range and a combined range of more than 620 miles (1,000km) with the help of a petrol engine. 

As we understand it, the Hyper Hybrid system is a range-extender rather than a typical plug-in hybrid set-up. That means the petrol engine won’t drive the wheels at all, instead its sole purpose will be to generate energy to power the e-motors. 

The company has said that the Hyper Hybrid powertrain will deliver industry-leading ultra-rapid charging speeds thanks to a 900V electrical architecture, while on-the-move charging abilities will ensure "uninterrupted electric performance in any situation, including acceleration at high speeds and in extreme cold weather.”

Is there still going to be an electric version?

Yes, we expect there will be a pure-electric version of the Porsche Macan rival to sit alongside the Hyper Hybrid. 

The Type 134 will sit on a shortened version of the flagship Lotus Eletre’s platform called the ‘Electric Premium Architecture’, which as the name suggests was designed exclusively for EVs. It can accommodate wheelbases ranging from 2,998mm to 3,100mm, as well as various battery sizes. 

The Eletre and Emeya are powered by 112kWh and 102kWh batteries respectively, however the Type 134 could use a smaller unit, potentially around 92kWh in capacity, which is the smallest size the platform was designed for. We also expect the Type 134 to use a dual-motor set-up for all-wheel drive, just like its big brother and sister, the quickest of which produces 893bhp and 985Nm of torque.

What will a Lotus mid-size SUV look like?

Despite its importance to the company, Lotus has released just one shadowy teaser image of the Type 134 SUV, and it doesn’t give much away except for the car’s headlight design. Thankfully, in an exclusive interview with Auto Express, Ben Payne, vice president of design for Lotus provided some insights into the styling of the brand’s first-ever mid-size SUV back in 2023.

“[Mid-size SUV] is such a large segment. That, in a way, makes this [the Type 134] one of the most difficult products we will do. To really penetrate that segment and achieve high volume, which is what it’s all about, we’re going to have to make a product that’s as broad in its appeal as possible.

“I imagine something that’s probably a little bit more pure in its expression. And we’ve got to balance usability, practicality and performance in that car, but we’ve got to make something unique that stands out. So you’ll see a continuation of this language and this DNA, but the expression of it being evolved and possibly simplified a little.”

He also explained: “We don’t want a cookie cutter approach. We’re going to evolve things and we’ll react to customer feedback, and we’ll react to the perception and changing market trends which evolve very, very quickly now, and we will push this design language forward. But there will be common threads that carry through the designs of the products.”

As such, we expect the Type 134 will feature a similar nose design to the Eletre, Emeya and Emira, which despite their vastly different sizes and purposes, do share some resemblance from the front. The active front grille from the Eletre and Emeya is also likely to be carried over, with the petals opening to help cool the battery and motors underneath, or remaining closed to help improve aerodynamic efficiency. We expect there’ll be other aerodynamic aides at the rear, along with a full-length lightbar like those one on its larger siblings.

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