What Happened To The Toyota 86 And How Much Can You Get One For Today?

There are two things that every single gear head enjoys. The first is a sports car. It is hard to resist the notion of speeding down the street in a sleek, sexy vehicle that does not have to sacrifice anything when it comes to performance. Vehicles will come in and out of fashion, but the sports car remains a coveted object. The second thing is a good price. Vehicles are an expensive proposition, both in the upfront cost of buying one and in maintaining it. So, any discount or reasonable sticker price will be looked at lovingly. The problem is that they rarely are able to come together. So, in 2017, it was rather wonderful when the Toyota 86 hit the marketplace in the United States.

With a starting price of $27,150, the Toyota 86 was one of the rare sports cars out there that was actually an affordable prospect for so many people who thought they may never be able to get themselves a beautiful sports car. However, after the 2021 model year, the Toyota 86 was taken off of the company's slate. However, for those wanting a Toyota 86, that car is actually still on the market, but you will not find it under that Toyota 86 name. In fact, it was being sold in the United States for years before that 2017 arrival.

[Featured image by MercurySable99 via Wikimedia Commons | Cropped and scaled | CC BY-SA 4.0]

The Toyota 86 may have hit the American marketplace for the 2017 model year, but you were actually able to get this vehicle starting all the way back in the 2013 model year. You just would not go to a Toyota dealership to pick it up. This was a vehicle that Toyota produced in collaboration with fellow Japanese automaker Subaru, and the units were actually being produced at a Subaru plant, in a similar partnership that Toyota currently has with Mazda today. When the vehicle debuted in the United States for 2013, both companies had their own versions of the sports car.

On the one hand, you had the Subaru BRZ, and that particular nameplate is still around today. The starting price for a brand new BRZ is $30,195. However, when Toyota brought it over for that year, it decided to do so not under one of the smaller brands it owned, Scion. So, if you wanted a Toyota 86 from Toyota, you would have to settle for the Scion FR-S.

The reason you still do not see the FR-S being sold is simple: Scion no longer exists. Toyota decided to dissolve the brand after the 2016 model year, and any cars it felt was worth keeping were rebranded as Toyotas. So, this is why the Toyota 86 shows up for the 2017 model year as the Subaru BRZ's sister vehicle.

[Featured image by qJake via Wikimedia Commons | Cropped and scaled | CC BY-SA 2.0]

Because the Subaru BRZ is still on the market, you would think that the Toyota 86 sports car would also still be available. However, if you head over to Toyota's website right now, you will not see it, and that is because the company decided to move on from the 86 after the 2021 model year. To be more accurate, Toyota decided to evolve what the 86 could be, and to do that, it turned the car over to the company's motorsport division, Gazoo Racing, to try and maximize the performance element of this sports vehicle. When the 2022 model year rolled around, the Toyota 86 was still on the market, but it was now known as the Toyota GR86.

This evolution saw the 2.0L flat-four engine utilized for the 86, BRZ, and FR-S up until that point replaced by a larger 2.4L H4. With this under the hood, you are looking at an output of 228 hp and 184 lb.-ft. of torque. For a sports car with a starting price under $30,000, those kind of numbers are nothing to sneeze at. This update also saw many different upgraded technological features, like a driver assist, and was designed with many of the materials and components that 86 models used on the racetrack would have. The most recent model of the Toyota GR86 comes highly recommended by SlashGear. So, if you were worried that the Toyota 86 was no more, it just has a new name.

Despite our recommendation, a Toyota GR86 might still a little too new to be a worthwhile deal used. Instead, you might want to look back on the first generation of the Toyota 86 for your sports car needs. You can get these for some fairly decent prices out there. For that first 2017 model year, Kelley Blue Book puts the average price for the two-door coupé version of the 86 at about $16,700, about 57% of the starting price of a 2024 GR86, and for the upgraded 860 Special Edition version of the car, that average price gets bumped up to roughly $19,900. Naturally, the more recent model years will increase those numbers little-by-little, but there is only about a $4,500 increase from those 2017 prices when you get to the last Toyota 86 model year.

Of course, the Toyota 86 market also includes both the Subaru BRZ and Scion FR-S. If you go all the way back to that very first 2013 model year, the Kelley Blue Book averages of these two vehicles are about $10,700 and $10,400, respectively. If getting a vehicle that is about 12 years old is a little daunting to you, then that final 2016 model year of the Scion FR-S might be more your speed, which averages out to around $13,100. As for the more recent Subaru BRZ model years, those tend to run just a few hundred dollars cheaper than the Toyota 86 units from the same year.

[Featured image by Ominae via Wikimedia Commons | Cropped and scaled | CC BY-SA 4.0]