Nissan hasn’t been having the easiest time of it lately, but the company’s spent the year or so implementing a turnaround plan it hopes will return it to its glory days. That’s included shutting factories, trimming its global model range and putting several in-development projects on hold, but also bringing back a series of what CEO Ivan Espinosa calls ‘heartbeat models’ – nameplates with real emotional resonance for fans of the brand.
This week, the company teased two of those models, both of which are sure to get long-time Nissan fans hot under the collar, but if you’re reading this in Europe, don’t get too excited – neither are likely to come to our shores.
A new Skyline for Japan
New Nissan Skyline teaser – front
Very few Nissan models have as much enthusiast staying power as the Skyline, and excitingly, a reborn version of the iconic sports saloon is on the way. Now, strictly speaking, the Skyline name’s never gone away – you can buy a new one in Japan right now, but it’s the same model that was briefly sold in Europe as the Infiniti Q50. It’s now 12 years old, and has never particularly been a car to get enthusiast juices flowing.
The new one looks set to solve that – Nissan’s only released a couple of teasers so far, but we can very clearly see a quarter of round tail lights that hark back to the legendary R32, R33 and R34 generations of the 1990s. What’s also clear is that it’s a four-door, something the Skyline’s always been available as despite the famous GT-R versions being based on the coupe.
Very little other info has been released, but Nissan says the new Skyline will deliver ‘performance, precision and driver-focused character.’ Unfortunately, Nissan also says it’s ‘a heartbeat model for Japan’, and it’s unlikely to make it out of that country with Skyline badges, if at all. Some rumours point to it being sold as a next-generation Infiniti Q50 in North America, but chances of it being sold in any form in Europe are slim to none.
A new Xterra for America
New Nissan Xterra teaser
A much-missed model from Nissan’s North American stable is the Xterra, a body-on-frame 4×4 sold between 1999 and 2015 in two generations, but having been confirmed by the brand’s US division for a return a few years ago, it too has been teased by Nissan.
Set to make a full return in 2028, what we’ve seen of the new Xterra so far is a strikingly boxy front end with a retrofuturistic LED running light setup across the nose. The manufacturer has already confirmed it’ll sit on a new body-on-frame platform and get both hybrid and pure petrol V6 powertrains.
It’s part of a new wave of body-on-frame SUVs arriving in the US, kicked off by the Ford Bronco a few years ago and soon to be joined by a rival from Hyundai too. The Xterra, however, is likely to remain largely confined to the North American market, and again, a European debut is highly unlikely.
A new Juke for Europe
Nissan Juke EV
Is there anything for European Nissan fans to get excited about? Not initially. Shown off in full alongside these teases was the new all-electric Juke, set to be built at Nissan’s plant in Sunderland, UK. It certainly continues the Juke tradition of bringing striking looks, looking rather like a concept car that’s escaped into the real world, but it’s not exactly going to excite people with fond memories of 180SXs and 350Zs.
All hope isn’t lost, though – Nissan recently confirmed plans to launch a spate of new Nismo performance models, some of which will surely be Europe-bound. Most for this market are likely to be electric, but if, say the Alpine A290 was to be repurposed into a Nismo version of the new Renault 5-based Micra, it certainly wouldn’t be anything to be too disappointed about.
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