The 2025 Toyota 4Runner Trailhunter is my new favorite SUV

Performance. We love it, don’t we? We love to brag about it, add more of it, and most of all use it.  Yeeeessss, good old speed and power. Thing is, when you use all the performance that modern cars have to offer, it tends to lead to flashing blue and red lights. Can we have fun at sub-light speeds? Yes, as I will now demonstrate in this 2025 Toyota 4Runner Trailhunter.

There’s no other word for it – this is one hilariously fun car.

The 2025 Toyota 4Runner Trailhunter Overview

Cars are costumes – they always will be. People can’t see you, but they see the image your car projects into the world.

What does a modern SUV say? “Active! Sport! Tough!”. But the reality is that those cars are nothing of the sort, just tall wagons with no personality. And like a house cat, they’ve sort of lost the plot. These aren’t Lions or Tigers anymore – they are fuzzy wittle things that lap at milk at take you to the store. How far are you really going to get in an Audi SQ5 once the apocalypse comes?

The pendulum can also swing too far the other way. It wasn’t that long ago that most SUVs were body-on-frame designs that dated back to World War 2, and they drove like it. Sure, you can destroy the dunes, but you’ll be miserable driving to and from. Cars spend 99% of their time on the road, not on the track or in the dirt. Capability can’t come at the expense of all the comfort.

Nope, nothing seemed just right. Then I hopped into this Toyota 4Runner.

It’s a hybrid, using a turbocharged four-banger that Voltrons with a battery to pump out 326 horsepower (that’s more than the base model, which forgoes the battery). A 4Runner is a capable SUV in its own right, but if you select the Trailhunter box, you get an Old Man Emu suspension (yes it’s a thing, look it up), 33-inch mudder tires, additional underbody protection, and a light bar that you can see from space.

Oh, and also an engine snorkel that makes the 4Runner sound like a 1,000-horsepowr Mark IV Supra. It alone is worth the price of admission – that price being $69,578.

Pricey? Not for this special ‘Yota.

Performance Score: 9. Prepare for dive

I did not get a chance to look at the specs for this car before having it dropped off, so I had no idea what was in store.

This is the best kind of surprise.

Engine

If cars offer soul through their engines, than this 2.4-liter turbo should get a character award.

On paper, it’s impressive – 326 horsepower (48 more than the non-hybrid version), with 456 lb-ft of muscle at just 1,700 RPM (that’s 139 more, nice). It’ll tow up to 6,000 pounds, and lug around this 5,500 pound truck with enough gusto to make you think it’s at least a V-6 underhood, if not a V-8.

But the pièce de ré·sis·tance comes in the form of an engine snorkel – great for wading through water, it pits the intake much closer to the cabin than it might normally be. Step on the gas, and you get the most hilarious, giggle-inducing, man-child blow-off valve sound this side of a Fast and Furious film. I can’t think of another stock car that does this, from a new Supra to an M3 – nothing. This alone makes the Trailhunter worth it.

Transmission

The 4Runner offers an eight-speed automatic as its only option, and it’s very refined. There’s no hesitation or slack when you need a kick-down, and its never confused as to what gear it needs to be in. Now we’re not talking Porsche DCT-levels of snap, but we don’t want that kind of experience in an off-road SUV.

The shifter is shaped in a way that you enjoy grabbing it and even resting your hand on it, like the throttle of the Millennium Falcon. Very few cars make a point of their shifters, oftentimes hiding them. I like this better.

Next to that is a dial that allows you to shift from two-wheel drive to four (high or low). It replaces those old-school shifters of yore, and allows you to keep tabs on what power goes where. Sure, all-wheel drive is more seamless (you can still shift this drivetrain up to about 60 MPH), but I never even needed that ability until the roads got messy, and this unit is much more rugged. 

Steering and Chassis

With so many street-going SUVs in the lineup, Toyota has kept the 4Runner old school with a body-on-frame design. Nissan did not do this with it’s used-to-be-famous Pathfinder. 

While the usual problems with a body-on-frame design are obvious in most, the 4Runner has no wiggles, grunts, pops, or jiggles, even when you aim it off-road. It is serious too – Old Man Emu shocks, 33-inch tires, stabilizer bars that disconnect, a locking rear differential, and more. Don’t make me recite it, and don’t just take this to the mall. Get it dirty, or get a lesser ‘Runner.

All that hardware (and some software) gives you the confidence to drive on dirt roads with more speed then what seems normal. The 4Runner can simply take the punishment.

On-road, it feels…well it feels like a truck. But not an unruly one – I got this up to 80 without any drama, something a Wrangler just isn’t good at. It’s far beyond in ability from anything else on the road, save for a Defender. Even the steering – a bit heavy, but direct and perfectly suited for dirt and road alike. 

Brakes

All 4Runners offer 13.4-inch front vented discs (13.2 in rear), and they work well for daily use. The pedal is firm and bites evenly, leaving you to contend only with the nose dive typical of an SUV this size.

Quad-piston front calipers are hidden behind those 18-inch wheels, and only offer a metallic finish that I’m sure will get coated with mud post-haste. 

Lifestyle Score: 9. A family affair

“Dad, I like this car a lot.”

High praise from my now eight-year-old daughter. She’s already five feet tall, and so doesn’t always fit in a back seat the way other kids might. The result: she’s picky. This 4Runner caters to that issue with plenty of leg room in the back, along with what she claims is the only rear HVAC vents that work in a car. The bench itself has no shape, but I can’t really see it being any less useful than a Land Cruiser.

Up front, you get very comfortable seats (a bit more lateral support would be nice), covered in what I can best describe as Gore Tex (Toyota calls is SofTex). If you bring mud in here, it will easily wipe off the seats. It’s simply a comfortable car to sit in, with only the Lexus GX550 offering better thrones.

No complaints about the trunk either, which is flat and wide. The tailgate also has a power glass window that goes all the way down – a 4Runner staple, and one of the last SUVs to offer this useful feature.

I do wish this had a better Step-up rail – like the Land Cruiser, it’s just a narrow bar that doesn’t offer much grip to get in. The GX, with its power step, is a better solution. 

Fuel Economy: 5. Gimme boost

Adding a battery pack to the 4Runner increases power, but also adds about a mile or two per tank, resulting in a combined 23 MPG. That’s great for a truck that weighs 5,500 pounds. Now, I came nowhere near that because, well you know why:

Brrrrt – WOOOSHHH!

You do need to rev this truck a bit to make sure the four-cylinder stays on boost, but the 19 MPG I managed would average out after awhile, making it a terrific alternative to a V-8.

Features and Comfort: 9. Lexus? No, but…

With an as-tested price of $69,578, the 4Runner is clearly in Lexus territory. No – it’s not Lexus-nice inside, but it’s not supposed to be.

Tough Love

All Toyotas, from as far back as I can remember, have always had this cheapish, plastic feel to the inside. This 4Runner mostly does away with that, and offers a full suite of goodies to boot.

There’s heated and vented front seats, Wireless Apple CarPlay with a 14-inch infotainment screen, a 14-speaker JBL stereo that sounds great, and enough buttons on the dash to make you feel like you’re a C-130 pilot (actually, it’s hard to see easily all those buttons at night). Even the floor mats, carpeted with a 4Runner logo, are really nice and high-end. At a time when companies like BMW are cutting back, Toyota has brought nice touches to its higher-end cars.

You must decide for yourself if you like the hard plastic trim that’s meant to mimic stone I suppose, but the yellow stitching is a nice offset to the greenish hues. I like that BIG TOYOTA badge too, in case I forget what car I’m driving. 

Toyota’s infotainment system works well enough – it’s pretty much identical to what Lexus has. Really, this is a nice car that’s easy to wipe down inside. Works for me.

MoreRunner

It’s sort of weird how Toyota has no TRD badge on this Trailhunter, kind of like how Subaru refuses to make an STi badge for its latest WRX. There is a TRD version of the 4Runner that’s very similar (and identical in base price), but lacks a few key features.

This example is painted a very nice shade called Everest, and it gets 18-inch bronze wheels and badging that match perfectly. There’s a fully-integrated light bar, Trailhunter nameplates (even in the headlights!), a specialized roof rack, and that distinctive snorkel. It looks bad ass, because it is. I also think it separates itself enough from lesser models, but it’s a handsome truck with classic proportions regardless.

The Land Cruiser has a presence about it that make people take notice, whereas this car, even with all its ‘roided up looks, sneaks under the radar. Select your costume accordingly. 

Others SUVs to consider

• 2023 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon 392
• 2024 Land Rover Defender 110
• 2024 Toyota Land Cruiser
• 2023 Ford Bronco Raptor

The 2025 Toyota 4Runner Trailhunter is for kids that never grew up

I am a grown man. I pay taxes, take care of my family, fix things around the house – you know, adulting. As such, there is little left that I am not skeptical of. The world has jaded me.

You want how much for how much?

Cars can help alleviate even these most severe cases of Adult-itis, if you let them. I don’t apologize for giggling like a five-year-old every time I stepped on the gas in the 4Runner. Or for doing every. Single. Time.

The 2025 Toyota 4Runner Trailhunter is more than a blow-off valve though. It makes sense as a car and a truck, never beating you up, never boring you, and never leaving you stranded. If a Jeep is a chore everywhere that’s paved, then the 4Runner has solved the problem by being just as much fun in the dirt without trying to annoy you above 70 MPH.

My Dad had a 2000 Nissan Pathfinder – was one tough son-of-a-bitch, that truck. He used to let me take my girlfriend home in it if the weather was bad. I dunno how I would end up in an empty parking lot on the way back, hunting for snow dunes and unpaved asphalt. Just sort of happened. Man that was fun – made me laugh like a kid.

4Runner is like that old Nissan. It makes me laugh at and doesn’t take itself too seriously, until it suddenly needs to. 

Yea, let’s go places 4Runner.