Subaru's first solo EV platform, tested on a prototype

On a test course just north of Tokyo, a camouflaged Subaru Outback is doing what most of the company's current electric cars cannot: it runs on a platform Subaru designed itself. The car, a test mule, uses an all-wheel-drive powertrain with a combined 509 horsepower (380 kW), and Subaru says the setup takes it from 0 to 100 km/h in under four seconds. One early headline rounds the figure to 510 horsepower.

The project marks a break with Toyota. In 2024 the two companies announced plans to co-develop four new electric SUVs by the end of 2026, including the updated Solterra and bZ4X (now the bZ in the US), so they could share development costs and manufacturing space. Subaru is now preparing to leave that partnership behind for its next generation of electric vehicles, as it tries to build its own brand in a market where it has fallen behind Chinese makers such as BYD and newcomers such as Tesla.

The new hardware has three main parts. The first is a dedicated EV platform, the flat structure that holds the battery and motors. The battery pack uses 4,000 cylindrical cells from Panasonic Energy and is 24% lighter than the previous pack; Subaru aims for an energy density 20% higher than the industry average, a target rather than a measured result. The e-axle, which combines the electric motor and drive gear at one axle, was developed with Aisin Group, a supplier also used by Toyota. Subaru's engineers say the motors deliver 30% more efficiency than the industry average. The second part is an in-house integrated control unit, which Subaru says will cut costs by being shared across its lineup. The third is software: over-the-air updates let the car receive new features remotely, and a custom chip developed with Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) is meant to bring artificial intelligence into future EyeSight driver-assistance updates.

For owners, the gain would be lighter, more efficient cars that improve after they leave the showroom, but that is still a plan. Subaru has not announced a launch date, only that some of the technology will begin rolling out around 2029, and it stressed that the Outback body is a stand-in whose design could change. The stakes are commercial: Subaru wants to deliver 1.2 million vehicles a year by the first half of the 2030s, which would top its record of 1.1 million set in 2018. It sold about 924,000 vehicles last year, a fraction of Toyota's sales of over 11 million. Whether a smaller brand can carry its own EV platform at that scale is the question the 2029 timetable will answer.