--- title: "2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro Review: I Want to Love This Truck, But I Just Can’t" date: "2026-10-19" modified: "2026-10-19" authors: - name: "Joel Feder" job_title: "Director of Content and Product" link: "https://www.thedrive.com/authors/joel-feder.md" url: "https://www.thedrive.com/car-reviews/2026-toyota-tundra-trd-pro-review-i-want-to-love-this-truck-but-i-just-cant" categories: - "Car Reviews" - "Toyota Reviews" - "Toyota Tundra" tags: - "Off-Road" - "pickup" - "Toyota" - "tundra" --- # 2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro Review: I Want to Love This Truck, But I Just Can’t ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() *\Joel Feder\* The 2026 [Toyota Tundra]() pickup truck, in its third generation for a whopping 26 years, needs no introduction. It’s the truck Senior Editor Caleb Jacobs [wishes he could recommend but can’t](). I’ll go further: it’s the truck I want to love but can’t. The ingredients are right on so many levels with the current Tundra TRD Pro: a hybrid powertrain, eye-catching and functional design, smart features and packaging, and great details. But man, Toyota was cheap with these, with an unforgivable safety oversight when it comes to being put to work, and the fact that [engines have been known to fail](). Spending a week with the TRD Pro only reminded me how frustrating it is to want to love this truck. ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ## The Basics To Toyota’s credit, it really has tried throwing a bunch of stuff at the Tundra to make people love it. For 2026, the TRD Pro can be optioned with the Tacoma TRD Pro’s ISO Dynamic Seats, fancy seats with shock absorbers in their backs. The truck we tested didn't have these. There’s a new Wave Maker blue color, which the truck I tested did feature, and boy, it’ll sear your retinas. No one’s losing this truck, ever. A new, larger 32.2-gallon fuel tank delivers more driving range, and trucks with the TRD Rally Package can option a TRD 3.0-inch lift kit. None of these neat things fix the truck’s fundamental issues, sadly. I actually love the way the Tundra looks. It’s butch but not obnoxious, with short overhangs, integrated fog and driving lights, depending on the trim, headlights with cool detailing in the housings on trucks equipped with LED headlights, and vertically oriented sequential LED taillights. Then there’s the functional side of things: low bed sides, a composite bed liner that won’t rust and has drilled drain holes, and my favorite: the electronic tailgate release next to the driver-side taillight that you can bump when your hands are full to open the tailgate. The TRD Pro model tested also rode on cool BBS forged wheels; however, the “black trim” on the A-pillars and B-pillars on some Tundras, including the $79,517 truck tested, is a matte wrap applique. It’s a sticker. It’s also astounding that the TRD Pro is the off-road variant, yet it has no tow hooks. What kind of oversight is that? This is before we even get to the Tundra's towing receiver, which has the weirdest design: a double wall and an air-gap setup, so a typical 3.5-inch hitch pin will not work. You need a 4.0-inch hitch pin. ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() Inside, things are good, but also bad. I love that it has hard buttons, knobs, and toggles for every essential function, from audio to climate control and powertrain. The console-mounted shifter is my favorite among trucks on the market today because it is the right size, shape, and placement. The seats are both comfortable and supportive without being too soft, too narrow, too low, or too short. The fact that the entire rear glass on the back of the cab slides down is one of my favorite features on any truck sold today. ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() Forward visibility is notably bad because of the high hood cowling at the base of the windshield, which is for tough looks, not functionality, and Toyota could only raise the roofline so high. The result? A short windshield. It’s so bad my son, years ago when the current truck launched in 2022, asked me why this truck has a small windshield. I asked whether it was up and down or side to side, and he said up and down. Smart kid. The 14.0-inch touchscreen is slapped onto the dashboard and rises up, further impacting visibility. To make matters worse, the screen’s huge, but it can’t multitask. That’s a lot of Apple CarPlay. It’s also perplexing to see a USB-A port front and center on the dashboard, where you’ll look at it for the truck’s entire lifespan. ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![]() ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() ![]() This is all before we get to the digi camo-covered leather seat patterns, which was a real choice. And the [shiny piano black plastic]() slathered all over the truck’s center console is a real issue, or at least it will be once the truck starts getting used. Even [Nissan’s admitted this](). The worst offense is how absolutely cheap everything feels and sounds. The plastics are all hard, and if you let the top cubby door on the front center armrest slam shut, you might look twice to see if it cracked after the sound it produces. I didn't crack the plastic cover, but boy, I thought I might have. You can see the mold-cut line on the A-pillar trim, which is just bad in a nearly $80,000 truck in 2026. The lock-and-unlock function sounds loud and cheap, like a 1980s rental car. Grab the door handles, and you can feel the cheapness. ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() **Joel Feder** ## Driving the 2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro Every Toyota Tundra has a 3.4-liter twin-turbo V6 under the hood, paired with a 10-speed automatic transmission. But TRD Pro models, among other trims, add a hybrid system with an electric motor sandwiched between the gas engine and the transmission, powered by a battery pack mounted under the rear seat. All in, the system is rated at 473 horsepower and 583 lb-ft of torque. Truly insane to me is the fact you can’t get the Toyota Tundra with full-time four-wheel drive. Even the off-road top dog, the TRD Pro model tested, had part-time four-wheel drive. ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() **Joel Feder** At one point, I wondered if the hybrid system was really necessary, since the non-hybrid trucks have 389 hp and 479 lb-ft of torque. The answer is, it’s nice to have. Around town, the hybrid truck can easily take off from a stop or roll slowly around the neighborhood without the gas engine kicking on quickly. When the powertrain transitions to power coming from both sources, it’s smooth, as you would expect from Toyota. More so than the Ford F-150 Hybrid’s transitions, which admittedly have gotten better over the years. But when you hitch a 5,000-pound boat-and-trailer setup to the rear of the truck, the hybrid system really shines, especially when taking off from a stop. The electric-motor power boost makes it feel like the truck isn’t working as hard off the line. But unlike an F-150, the Tundra never ever lets you forget that a boat is hooked to the backend. Worse, and frankly unacceptable, the automatic emergency braking system doesn’t automatically disable when you plug a trailer’s lights into the truck. The truck recognizes a trailer’s hooked up but fails to disable key towing safety features. Should you forget to manually turn off the reverse automatic emergency braking system, which is buried in the menu system within the digital gauge cluster, before backing up a trailer, and should someone be standing in the boat while backing up at the boat launch, that person could potentially fall out of the boat when the truck slams on the brakes. *Ask me how I know.* Like all Toyotas with a Hybrid Max badge, this powertrain isn’t about efficiency; it’s about power. The EPA-rated 18 mpg city is impressive, but the 20 mpg highway and 19 mpg combined are less so. In the real world, the numbers aren’t worth bragging about. Over 105 miles of mixed suburban driving, the Tundra averaged 16.3 mpg, and on over 204 miles of highway driving at over 70 mph, it averaged 16.7 mpg. ![2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro]() **Joel Feder** ## Verdict The 2026 Toyota Tundra costs $43,355, including a $2,095 destination charge, but that’s the base SR Double Cab with a 6.5-foot bed. Most people won't buy that, and it's a far cry from what I tested here. The loaded-up TRD Pro I tested cost $79,517, as it added everything from the off-road model’s 18-inch BBS wheels, LED light bar up front, Fox shocks, and a $2,999 TRD Performance package with a Cat-Back exhaust my wife said was obnoxious, along with dual air intakes and, I can’t make this up, a Premium Fuel Sticker that’s listed as an item on the window sticker. In the world of trucks, the 2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro sadly isn’t what you might call eye-watering in terms of pricing. But what bothers me is that there’s so much to love, yet cheap materials and style-over-substance choices undermine it all. *Toyota* *provided The Drive with a seven-day loan of this vehicle for the purpose of writing this review.* ## 2026 Toyota Tundra TRD Pro Specs | **Base Price (TRD Pro)** | $43,355 ($79,517) | | --- | --- | | **Powertrain** | 3.4-liter twin-turbo V6 \| 10-speed automatic \| four-wheel drive | | **Horsepower** | 437 @ 5,200 rpm | | **Torque** | 583 lb-ft @ 2,400 rpm | | **Seating Capacity** | 5 | | **Curb Weight** | 6,095 pounds | | **Towing Capacity** | 11,175 pounds | | **Ground Clearance** | 9.0 inches | | **Off-Road Angles** | 26.2° approach \| 24.2° departure | | **EPA Fuel Economy** | 18 mpg city \| 20 highway \| 19 combined | | **Score** | 6.5/10 | ## Author Overseeing what you see, read, touch, hear, and interact with from the vast lakes of Minnesota, Joel Feder shapes how The Drive looks and operates as the head of content and product initiatives. On a daily basis, Joel leads the newsroom and editorial staff playing point on both short-term coverage and long-term strategic plans. His mission is to help ensure The Drive shapes the future of automotive media by helping the team execute original reporting, breaking news, and exclusive opportunities. Regarded as an industry insider and recognized by colleagues, fellow journalists, and manufacturers as a point-person and leader in the industry, Joel owns and runs the largest automotive professionals group on Facebook in an effort to serve and help others. Joel serves as a juror for the World Car Awards. In addition, he sits on the Board of Directors for Move Forward MN, a local non-profit that helps at-risk youth with barrier-free mental health and housing services. While you’re reading this he’s either on his computer or iPhone chasing the latest news or drafting a story. ### Author social links [Instagram]() [LinkedIn]() [Bluesky]() [Email]()