I’m glad the Lexus LFA is finally getting its due. Sure, it’s bittersweet that it seemingly took until the last five years for people to see past its price tag and badge and recognize its brilliance, but a car with a naturally aspirated V10 revving to 9,000 rpm and a carbon-fiber monocoque at a time when that was still reserved for flagship hypercars is a special thing, especially looking as good as it did. We appreciate it even more now, on the eve of Toyota and Lexus revealing their long-awaited follow-up. It will surely be a great drive and sounds mean with a twin-turbo V8—but it’s certainly no LFA.
Toyota shared a clip of the supercar’s sound during a livestream ahead of the Japan Mobility Show at the end of the month. The presentation was interesting: First, the stream played the exhaust note of the inline-six out of Toyota’s classic 2000GT, followed by the LFA’s signature sound. Finally, it ended with the new flagship’s breathier, raspier, lower tone. Rumor has it it’s electrically assisted, and you can hear it in the video below. (If pressing play doesn’t take you to the timestamp, it starts at 44:51.)
It’s good—I’d never say it wasn’t—but it doesn’t exactly leave an impression. I actually heard this car live at the Goodwood Festival of Speed, when Toyota engineers fired it up alongside the GT3 racing version at the GR booth. We shared a clip on The Drive Instagram at the time, but this is probably the most direct, untarnished snippet of sound anyone’s been able to capture yet.
The thing is, so many high-end performance cars these days use a V6 or V8 with forced induction, to the point where they’re starting to blend together. There are differences, sure, but the sheer range that we used to enjoy in decades past of cars sharing a circuit with vastly unique engine layouts has diminished somewhat. At least among road cars, because fortunately, prototype endurance racers are still keeping the spice alive. Thanks to Aston Martin, we still get to hear a naturally aspirated V12 at a racetrack in 2025.
All this to say that while we’re very enthusiastic to finally see what the GR team has been cooking up—apparently, the reveal will happen on December 4, so we won’t have to wait until the Tokyo Auto Salon in January—it’s best to check engine note expectations at the door now. Who knows, maybe Toyota will bring the 2000GT and LFA to accompany this upcoming third act on its inevitable world tour, just so we can hear the difference in person.
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Backed by a decade of covering cars and consumer tech, Adam Ismail is a Senior Editor at The Drive, focused on curating and producing the site’s slate of daily stories.
