New Toyota GR Yaris revealed: major upgrades for AWD hot hatch

• New Toyota GR Yaris revealed
• Minor styling tweaks
• All-new interior design
• Major mechanical changes
• More power and torque from three-cylinder engine
• On sale later this year

This is the new Toyota GR Yaris. It may look pretty similar on the outside to the outgoing car, but there are some fairly major mechanical changes under the skin.

This rally-bred hot hatch offers more power, uprated suspension and the option of an automatic gearbox for the first time. Carwow was given the chance to get this car on track to sample the upgrades first hand.

New Toyota GR Yaris design

There aren’t too many clues on the outside to give away the fact that this is the new Toyota GR Yaris. It retains the squat stance and cool rally-inspired styling of the current car, but there are a few subtle differences.

You get a new front bumper with a more aggressive lower air intake, and there are vents on the side which smooth airflow over the wheels. This bumper is also now split into three pieces which can be replaced independently of each other, making it easier and cheaper to repair if you get a bit carried away on the track.

There’s nothing to report down the side, you even have the same forged alloy wheels as the current car. The rear spoiler has been tweaked though, and it’s now body coloured rather than black. There’s also a full-width light bar at the back, and the lower diffuser has been replaced with a mesh grille.

New Toyota GR Yaris interior

While the exterior has been given a subtle makeover, the new Toyota GR Yaris has a completely overhauled interior. Toyota has taken feedback from customers and used this to make a whole raft of improvements.

You have a completely new dash design, with all the controls being integrated in a huge, squared-off binnacle, a bit like a 1980s rally car. The central screen has been lowered by 5cm, and the rear-view mirror has been moved to improve your forward visibility, something which buyers had a gripe with in the outgoing car.

Fans of the Carwow YouTube channel may remember Mat Watson complaining that the seat was mounted too high in the current GR Yaris. Well Toyota has listened and lowered the chairs in this car by 25mm. This makes you feel much more connected to the car, and less like you’re sitting on top of it.

New Toyota GR Yaris suspension and chassis

The main reason you’ll be buying a Toyota GR Yaris is because of the way it handles on a twisty road, and the brand’s engineers have been testing the car to destruction in the pursuit of ultimate handling prowess.

We mean that literally as well. An important element of testing for Toyota is breaking stuff so it can identify weak points and improve them. This is why the new GR Yaris has strengthened suspension arms, following a bent component on a rally stage.

The gear linkage has also been strengthened, after Toyota’s Chairman Akio Toyoda managed to break one of the gear shift cables.

New Toyota GR Yaris engine and gearbox

Extensive testing of the 1.6-litre three-cylinder engine has also led to multiple improvements under the bonnet of the GR Yaris.

This new car uses a tweaked version of the old engine which is lifted from the bigger GR Corolla. It has lightened, strengthened pistons following some damage caused to the old ones during hours of hard track use, and it has stronger exhaust valves as well.

Add in higher injection pressure than before and you get an increase of 19hp over the old GR Yaris, with this hot hatchback now putting out 280hp. Torque is also up, going from 360Nm to 390Nm.

Power is still sent to all four wheels, and the four-wheel drive system now has improved cooling because Toyota found that it could overheat when pushed to the limit. The six-speed manual gearbox has also been improved with a slicker shift, but that’s not the biggest news on the gearbox front.

That’s because the new Toyota GR Yaris is available with, shock horror, an automatic gearbox. The purists may see this as heresy, however Toyota is keen to make sure everyone can enjoy this hot hatchback, even those with an automatic-only driving licence.

Before you start panicking thinking the gearbox is lifted out of a Prius, it’s not a CVT automatic. It’s actually a torque converter unit. Toyota didn’t use a dual-clutch gearbox because they can be quite jerky and make the car harder to live with in stop-start traffic, but the internals have been optimised to make sure it’s as engaging as possible.

The automatic also gets launch control, as well as the same limited-slip differential as the manual car. Going for two pedals over three does incur a weight penalty though, with 20kg being added to the mass.

When can I buy a new Toyota GR Yaris?

The new Toyota GR Yaris will go on sale later this year, however an official price is yet to be announced. You can expect it to fetch a small premium over the outgoing model though, with a figure of around £32,000 likely.

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