Biggest automotive hits and misses of 2025, according to Drive

With another 12-month automotive chapter soon to close, there have been numerous car-related highs and lows over the last year.

And Drive has been front and centre to see it all unfold as the biggest automotive publisher in the country, utilising various streams across web, print, and television.

Here are our takes on the best and worst of 2025.

It’s been refreshing to see car manufacturers come to realise that not everybody wants commonly used controls buried in a touchscreen.

We don’t necessarily wish to scroll through multiple nested menus to open the glovebox or adjust a mirror.

The smarter car makers have figured this out. Now all we can do is hope that the penny drops with the others.

A properly engineered ADAS system is a worthy addition to any vehicle. Unfortunately there are way too many that actually distract the driver, and some are borderline dangerous in the way that they try to hold a vehicle in a given lane when it’s necessary to move sharply to avoid potholes or similar.

ANCAP has a responsibility to heavily penalise those manufacturers that bring sub-par, box-ticking ADAS installations to market. We wouldn’t accept shonky airbags or woeful brakes, so why should we give a pass to terrible ADAS?

The ascension of China, in becoming the world's number one producer of new cars, simply cannot be ignored.

Gone are the days of comical build quality, decade-old designs and blatant counterfeiting; we are seeing a step change in the quality and capability of new cars, at a rate few thought ever possible. And things are still moving. Fast.

Based on November sales data, Chinese-sourced cars now account for 20 per cent of all new vehicles in Australia.

There are now about 20 brands on sale that are Chinese-owned and operated, with a few more reporting to Chinese parent company board rooms, and more still simply turning to China for production and export.

The Beijing and Shanghai Motor Shows have essentially replaced Geneva as the international automotive events to watch, and with things showing no hint of slowing down, it almost feels like China is just warming up.

Forget the AI revolution and the expansion of Web 3.0 technology; it's China Auto 3.0, or perhaps even 4.0, that we should all be paying attention to.

To be more correct, this should really be 'Japan... for now' as the recent Tokyo motor show did show a lot of green-shoot promise coming from Japan's once dominating automotive industry.

But for now... Japan missed the boat a few years ago and in many ways, is still at the dock waiting to catch up.

Let's be clear. Embracing the advent of new technologies costs money, and as Tesla has shown, it is often easier to do with a clean sheet of paper rather than incorporate into legacy infrastructure.

Combine these, and have limited resources to support an already stretched legacy of automotive production in a very fast-paced environment, and you will be left behind.

Yes, Toyota is still the world's number one car brand, but it's becoming a harder beachhead to defend.

The new Toyota RAV4, for instance, isn't so much an evolutionary step change as an 'update'; Mazda's new CX-5 will launch with a hybrid, months after the petrol model arrives; the Mitsubishi Triton ute is being outsold by the plug-in hybrid BYD Shark.

Are Japan's days numbered, though? I hope not. The country can produce the world's best cars when it needs to - or perhaps, when it wants to, and, in reality, that time is upon us.

As noted above, there was some promise shown in Tokyo this year, but we will have to wait and see if global automotive pressure will again create some true diamonds.

Plug-in hybrids are a great stepping stone to electric power for many new-car buyers, without making the full commitment. It's no surprise this fuel type has more than doubled its sales year on year.

Bring on more choice in 2026, including Toyota Australia's first-ever plug-in hybrid in the new-generation RAV4.

Since relaunching in Australia in 2023, the Chery group has introduced three brands – Chery, Jaecoo and Omoda – and 14 unique nameplates, including renaming the Tiggo 4 Pro to Tiggo 4 earlier this year, with a new rear design and a hybrid powertrain, just six months after the Pro's launch.

And, its debut model, the Chery Omoda 5, is now marketed locally as the Chery C5 to avoid overlap with the Omoda brand, but it is sold overseas as an Omoda.

Continuous improvement is great, sure, but it's a bit of a mess, and Chery needs to slow down. It is confusing enough for someone who follows the automotive industry every day, let alone consumers who only look at the new- and used-car markets every few years.

Is there a market for more Chery SUVs when it introduces its fourth brand, Lepas – which was established globally only this year – in Australia in 2026? Will all of its brands still exist in Australia in the next decade?

It's even more mind-boggling on a global level, with other Chery brands including Fulwin, Exeed, Jetour, iCar/iCaur, Luxeed and Rely, some of which might come to Australia as soon as next year.

Great Wall Motors, which has many sub-brands in China, offers the most suitable model for each segment in Australia under its GWM master brand, and perhaps Chery should follow suit.

In case you've forgotten, the Tesla brand took some damage earlier in 2025. Although the brand's cars are good, this has led some to defer their purchase and look elsewhere for a new electric car. 

Thankfully, the market answered with a slew of fresh alternatives. We've seen the arrival of the Volkswagen ID.4, XPeng G6, Zeekr 7X, and the BYD Sealion 7 – all priced around the $55K mark. 

Don't get me wrong, the Model Y remains a great car. But more choice is a great outcome for the consumer.

I had run-ins with the Zeekr X's safety systems, the single cupholder was disappointing, the silly key, the slow-to-respond infotainment system, and finicky controls for the side mirrors were all low points for what is marketed as a prestige car.

Its interior impressed with its design and soft-touch elements, and it does come at an alluring price. But there were too many other pitfalls for this 'premium' car to be considered alongside its established rivals. Thankfully, the brand's latter arrival, the Zeekr 7X, is better. 

This was the year that electric cars finally became affordable, hitting new low points in pricing that meant they matched hybrids and even some petrol-powered models.

The Geely EX5, Zeekr 7X, and Nissan Ariya all arrived on the scene positioned at a point where buyers could choose whether they were ready to make the all-electric plunge.

No, not everyone is ready or equipped for an EV, but lowering the barrier-to-entry and giving customers the choice is what's important here.

With Toyota and Mazda refreshing some of their biggest models in the form of the RAV4 and CX-5 respectively, it turns out they might not be as 'all new' as marketed.

Recycling both platforms and powertrains, but with fresh sheet metal and a box-fresh interior, they are both undoubtedly new, but it looks like gone are the days of new-generation models also debuting new-generation platforms.

With development resources shifting more towards all-electric models and hybrids, it means we might be in the awkward middle ground between old products and proper new-generation metal.

Significant upgrades and changes to the chassis and suspension for this ute makes it better at being a ute. Not pandering to ideals of ride comfort, technology and convenience, but boosting payloads and capabilities instead. Bravo to Ford for investing so heavily into something like this.

The Toyota HiLux – as fit for purpose as it might be – feels like it has left more on the table than it has taken off. No doubt it will be effective at the core roles a 4x4 ute needs to deliver on, and it will also sell its socks off. But Toyota's decision to not join the competition with more size, space and competition is a curious one.

Hit is certainly a word that applies to the Atto 1, the fact that you can buy an EV for under $30,000 now, and it offers an intuitive and fun driving experience, along with a weird amount of power for its size.

Its size category is overrun by imported vehicles that are older yet only a few dollars cheaper than an Atto 1 brand new.

The car makes sense for someone who doesn’t leave their LGA or a city dweller, plus they’re incredibly cute.

The biggest miss was the Deepal E07 minitruck. As an all-round weirdo, the E07 promised to be a weird conversation starter among a field of primer-grey boring EV-SUVs.

But it falls short in quite a few categories, the amount of power produced by the AWD Performance model is far beyond what the actual chassis, brakes and suspension can handle.

It’s all well and good to say “well, it’s not made for sporty driving,” but it has 440kW, and it needs to be able to handle someone who has never driven a fast car before jumping behind the wheel.

A lot can be said about the ADAS as well, and not a lot that will be good.

In the lead-up to its official reveal, the response from readers already signalled that the Ford Ranger Super Duty was going to be a massive hit

Ford didn't disappoint, with worthwhile upgrades to the Ranger's capability in a package that's much more modern and comfortable than a LandCruiser 70 Series could ever hope to match.

Offering a diesel V6 at the same time as the Cruiser traded its V8 for a four-cylinder motor was a genius move, and bigger payloads and towing capacity without the need for expensive upgrades are sure to cement its success.

I don't want to damn it before it launches, but the Honda Prelude feels like a miss – or at least a missed opportunity.

But I'm not upset about the performance. The 149kW hybrid is absolutely fine. The Prelude was never a Type-R hero, it was always a bit more cultured from factory.

It's the styling. A Prelude always looked long and low, but this new car channels Integra more than Prelude. It's a hatch, not a coupe, and the front end styling is a bit too corporate Honda, and not as daring as the eye-catching fourth and fifth-gen Preludes.

I'm hoping Honda has more in store, but I really wish the company had shown its wild side with this new model.

Tung Nguyen has been in the automotive journalism industry for over a decade, cutting his teeth at various publications before finding himself at Drive in 2024. With experience in news, feature, review, and advice writing, as well as video presentation skills, Tung is a do-it-all content creator. Tung’s love of cars first started as a child watching Transformers on Saturday mornings, as well as countless hours on PlayStation’s Gran Turismo, meaning his dream car is a Nissan GT-R, with a Liberty Walk widebody kit, of course.

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