Is Ford Really Bringing Back The Thunderbird In 2025?

The Thunderbird has solidified itself as an iconic American car. Ford released 11 generations from the mid-50s to 2005, racing into Americana when early Thunderbird models kept making movie appearances. When a car becomes part of America's automotive history, car enthusiasts often wonder if the model will return with classic designs and improved performance. Unfortunately for fans of classic American cars, the 2025 Thunderbird is nothing more than an untrue online myth. 

By the time the Thunderbird was discontinued, it wasn't really matching the car market — or even the rest of Ford's lineup. But now that we've been without the classic car for nearly 20 years, fans sometimes talk about a possible revival. Images have started to spread online of a new Thunderbird variant but with luxury advancements and even hybrid components. These images are just made with AI and other digital art tools, however, and are not official in any way.

Ford has often been the subject of AI-generated car rumors, including the Mustang pickup, which is not real either. AI image tools are becoming more advanced, and it can be hard to tell which are legit in some instances, but there are a few tricks that can reveal if the image you're seeing of a Thunderbird is real or AI. 

First, AI images are often overly shiny and lack attention to detail. You can see in the image above that the car is insanely glossy but lacking in a lot of little details — the background is especially bare and the taillights are strangely simplified with a car line incorrectly going through it vertically. A second giveaway is often the lettering. Check out the way Ford is spelled in the above image, with an extra D at the end. The word Thunderbird is also hard to decipher in the second half. The featured image has inconsistent spacing between letters, and the font style itself is also not any certain style used by Ford. 

If you're still unsure if a YouTube video is sharing real prototypes or not, expand the details under the video. Most will say that the content was "altered" or "synthetic." The term "digitally generated" may also appear.