Automakers Killed Sedans For SUVs, Now They Want Them Back

During the first quarter of 2026, the Toyota Camry did something it hadn’t achieved in almost a decade: it outsold every one of its stablemates, including the ever-dominant RAV4. It wasn’t even all that close. The Camry delivered 78,255 units, up 11.3% year over year, while the RAV4 managed 59,869 units, down 48.1%. To be fair, the SUV is caught mid-transition to a new generation, which distorts the comparison.

Nevertheless, automakers are beginning to spot a new trend. Traditional cars might be about to make a comeback, and plenty of brands are taking notice.

More: Chrysler Could Get A Sedan Back, But It Won’t Be Like You Remember It

Crossovers and SUVs became popular for several reasons including practicality, but most notably because they offer higher profit margins to automakers. Brands marketed these form factors like crazy, convinced buyers that they were better than cars, and here we all are in a world of rolling compromises. Those same carmakers created a new issue over the last decade, though. These SUVs and crossovers are getting so expensive that they’re pricing plenty of buyers out of the market.

Industry Reconsiders Car Segment

According to a new report from Auto News, that’s one major reason that execs at Ford, Nissan, Stellantis, and others are re-thinking sedans. Sedans are “unapologetic and unexpected,” remarked Tiago Castro, Nissan’s U.S. marketing and sales chief. “It‘s an opportunity to connect back to the roots of the brand.” No doubt, heritage plays a role here, too, as a marketing tool.

“A lot of people are asking for sedans,” Stellantis design head Ralph Gilles told Car Design News. “Young designers want hatchbacks like the GTI of the 1980s. They want a personal car that’s fun to drive and easy to park. It’s making us rethink different form factors.”

Perhaps no endorsement is as big as the one from the Blue Oval brand. “The sedan market is very vibrant,” Ford’s CEO Jim Farley said at the Detroit Auto Show in January. “It’s not that there isn’t a market there. It’s just we couldn’t find a way to compete and be profitable. Well, we may find a way to do that.” So, they’re saying that there’s a chance and new regulations might push things over the edge.

Tighter And Looser Rules

Automakers long pushed back against fuel economy standards they said were too hard to meet (50.4 mpg targets). Now, the federal government is set to relax those rules (34.5 mpg targets), but the change will likely come with a side effect. Part of what made SUVs and crossovers so profitable is that they could be classified as “light trucks.”

That classification allowed automakers to miss fuel economy targets that would otherwise apply to a car. The new fuel economy rules would reclassify crossovers and many small SUVs as passenger vehicles. If that happens, it would disincentivize automakers from building so many crossovers. One can only hope.