Acura has published pricing information for the 2022 MDX Type S, the first SUV that the firm has deemed worthy of wearing this esteemed badge. It's priced well above the entry-level MDX but it gains a long list of performance, comfort, and technology upgrades to make up for it.

Pricing for the Type S starts at $67,745 including a mandatory $1,045 destination charge. In comparison, the base MDX starts at $48,245 including the same destination charge. While that's a significant difference, the range-topping Type S benefits from 3.0-liter V6 engine that's turbocharged to 355 horsepower, a rear-biased all-wheel-drive system, Acura's first air suspension system, and Brembo-sourced four-piston front brake calipers. Visual changes (including a grille that sends about 10% more air to the engine bay) further set the Type S apart.

A rare Nissan Autech Zagato Stelvio AZ1 is currently up for sale in France and could be one of the lowest mileage examples on earth.

If you're a fan of classic electric car conversions, you're going to want to see this electric Nissan Bluebird, or as Nissan calls it, the "Newbird." Nissan just revealed the EV in conjunction with the 35th anniversary of production at the Sunderland, UK, plant. Back in 1986, the Nissan Bluebird was the first car off the line at this plant.

Today, this Bluebird has new life breathed into it thanks to the powertrain out of a Nissan Leaf and a snazzy new paint job. The original engine and transmission were removed and replaced with a Leaf's motor, inverter and 40 kWh battery pack. The pack itself was split into two parts to make it fit. Half the battery modules are under the hood, and the other half are in the trunk. Nissan says this arrangement gives the "Newbird" a properly even weight distribution.

The 2022 Mazda MX-5 Miata is here, and there are a couple notable updates and changes for the new model year.

Right off the top, Mazda is introducing a new handling improvement technology on the Miata that it calls "Kinematic Posture Control," or KPC for short. Mazda says that KPC "applies a very slight brake to the inner rear wheel during high-g cornering. This pulls down on that corner, suppressing body roll, and making steering response feel more linear through tight or rough corners. Slightly stronger braking is used when accelerating through a corner, enhancing the limited slip effect."

TOKYO — Toyota Motor Co said on Wednesday it planned to build 800,000 vehicles globally in January, a record for the month, as it ramps up production to make up for output lost to parts shortages.

"We will continue to maintain our production forecast of the 9 million unit level" for the year to March 31, the company said in a press release.

Tucked deep in the back left corner of Toyota's pictures highlighting its unveiled fleet of future electric vehicles was the model that arguably has the potential to be the biggest hit of them all: the Compact Cruiser EV. 

Even from afar it's clear what it is: a reborn FJ Cruiser, albeit smaller, electric and almost certainly a crossover. The front end styling is unmistakable even if the trademark round headlights have been swapped out for more modern LED units. The profile indicates a more conventional squared-off rear end and four proper doors. The FJ Cruiser had rear-hinged half doors. It also barely looks like a concept. If Toyota doesn't build something that looks 90% like this, we'd be stunned. 

One of the obstacles to a fully autonomous future are the roads upon which theoretical autonomous vehicles would drive. Cameras and sensors use the painted lane lines to help them trace a path and help cars stay in their respective lanes. If you've ever driven a car with some level of lane-keeping or lane-following assistance, you might've noticed that without any lane markings, the system becomes relatively useless.

So, how does one improve matters so you can use driver assistance features in more situations? The answer is relatively simple in concept. Road operators need to maintain our roads better and with driving assistance features in mind. Honda knows this too, and it's just devised a system to aid road workers in doing exactly that.

Toyota just showed a huge number of concept cars as a preview of what it has planned for the future through 2030. Naturally, Lexus is a significant part of that, and it had its own group of vehicles to show including the production RZ 450e. Not only that, the company announced it would have a full line of electric cars with the goal of having all of its sales in North America, Europe and China be electric. By 2035, Lexus will only sell electric cars.

Leading the lineup of future electric cars is the production RZ 450e. Unfortunately, no specifications were given. It looks very close to the LF-Z concept car from earlier this year, but with some of the more fiddly detailing cleaned up, and some of the character lines actually amplified. We wouldn't be surprised if it's closely related to the Toyota bZ4X under the metal.

Toyota has outlined its plans for electric cars through 2030 in a big way: It showed a whole bunch of full-size concept cars for both Toyota and Lexus. They aren't outlandish concepts either, and the company says they are previewing future models, of which there will be many. Toyota said it will launch 30 electric models between now and 2030, with a goal of reaching 3.5 million global EV sales by that time. There will be a wide variety of models, as represented by these concepts, with the idea being that the successful models will help determine the brand's direction. The company also announced that it has expanded its investment in battery technology by a little over $4.4 billion, to a total of over $17.6 billion.

We're focusing on the Toyota cars, here, and there were two sets of concepts shown. One was a very large and diverse group called the Lifestyle cars, and the other was a smaller, more restrained set of bZ models, taking after the bZ4X that's headed to dealers soon. Of the two sets, the Lifestyle cars particularly caught our eye.

Honda again undermined the work of spy photographers around the world by publishing images of a fully-camouflaged 2023 Civic Type R. The pre-production prototype is shown undergoing a series of high-speed validation tests on the Suzuka Circuit alongside its predecessor.

While the hatchback's final design is literally kept under wraps, we can tell that several key styling cues will differentiate it from the standard version of the 11th-generation Civic. Up front, it receives a bigger grille and larger intakes that direct more cooling air into the engine bay. It wears model-specific side skirts on both sides, and its rear end features a big rear wing plus a trio of cool-looking exhaust outlets. New-look wheels add a finishing touch to the design, while a lower ride height hints at the suspension changes that engineers are testing at Suzuka.

In the Odyssey, Homer repeatedly describes the spreading light of a new day as "rosy-fingered dawn." The dawn of subscription-based vehicle features is upon us, but instead of rosy fingers, these are the fat fingers of profit spreading to grab what they can from your wallet. Toyota joins the fray with an update to its key-based remote start function for vehicles going back to 2018. Car shopping site CoPilot wrote about this over the summer when discussing the new RAV4, but the matter flew under the radar until a Reddit user decided to read the fine print in Toyota's marketing materials for the automaker's Remote Connect app suite. The contentious bit, as Toyota confirmed to The Drive, is that Toyota is making the key-fob-based remote start part of its Remote Connect services. Toyota will require owners to pay for a subscription to use the remote start function on their key fobs after a trial period ends, that trial period lasting anywhere from three to 10 years.

We should explain that there are two ways to remote start Toyota vehicles. One is using the fob, a chip in the key sending a radio signals to a chip in the car to let the car know to start. This one relies only on proximity communication between key and car; typically, as long as the fob chip, fob battery, and vehicle chip are in good working order, all should be well. But that's not the case here, which we'll get to. The second way is by using Toyota's Remote Connect suite of services that costs either $8 per month or $80 per year. These services operate through a cell or wi-fi connection and include remote start, finding your car in a parking lot or finding PHEV charging locations, monitoring teen drivers, and locking or unlocking the car. 

As the supply chain issues brought on by the pandemic continue, automakers struggle with meeting their production targets. The latest victim is Toyota, who will be expanding the production halts at some of their factories in Japan.

The driver of a Honda CR-V has been lucky to avoid serious injuries after being cut off by a pickup truck at an intersection in the U.S.

Time-capsules are quite popular these days and this Toyota Pickup from 1993 is a fitting example. Despite its age, the model only has 94 miles (151 km) on the odometer, and its showroom condition means it could gather lots of interest when it goes under the hammer by Mecum auctions in Kissimmee this January.