Once thought to have been cancelled, images of the new Lada Niva have appeared in recent patent filings in Russia.
The modern successor to the Lada Niva – Russia's home-grown equivalent of the Suzuki Jimny 4WD, which has been on sale since 1977 – finally looks to be nearing production.
A new generation of the small four-wheel-drive was in development until 2022, when parent company Renault sold the Niva's maker, AvtoVAZ, and left the country after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
The project was presumed to be scrapped, but newly published patents have revealed an updated design that indicates work is underway within Russian borders, without Renault's involvement.
Russian President Vladimir Putin was shown a mockup of the presumed Niva successor, codenamed T-134, during an official visit to the AvtoVAZ manufacturing plant in January last year, according to a Kremlin press release at the time.
No official images were published of the T-134 from the visit, however some blurry imagery of the T-134 taken during the president's visit soon surfaced online.
The T-134 prototype closely resembled the Lada Niva Vision concept first unveiled in 2021 – albeit only ever as a sketch – with mild changes to its proportions and details.
Patent documents, published 6 May 2026, support the T-134's concept-inspired styling, but show the grille now clearly spells out 'NIVA', rather than a Lada badge.
The Lada Niva successor had been considered axed since 2022 when Renault sold off its stake in Lada. At the time, the car was reportedly intended to be built on the same Renault platform as the Nissan Juke.
The reappearance of the new Lada in patent documents doesn’t guarantee it will ever make it to production, but it's a sign that the project is far from dead.
It is unclear what platform the Lada Niva’s T-134 successor will be underpinned by, but Russian automotive publication Зарулем claims it is based on that of the Lada Vesta, a small sedan launched in the country in 2015.
Last year, Lada revealed the Azimut, its first new model in a decade, based on the Vesta platform.
The Lada Niva 4x4 has been in production in Russia since 1977, and continues to sell tens of thousands of examples a year in its home market today.
The Niva was sold in Australia between 1984 and 1998, but current international sanctions on Russia mean it is unlikely that any new Lada models will come to Australian shores anytime soon.
A second-generation Niva was revealed in 1998, still sold today as the Niva Travel, alongside the iconic original.
Max is the News Publishing Coordinator for Drive. He enjoys creating engaging digital content, including videos, podcasts, interactive maps, and graphs. Prior to Drive, he studied at Monash University and gained experience working for various publications. He grew up playing Burnout 3: Takedown on the PS2 and was disappointed when real life car races didn’t have the same physics.
