Welcome to Brand Breakdown, a series of comprehensive yet easy-to-digest guides to your favorite companies, with insights and information you won’t find on the average About page.
Lexus is Toyota’s luxury car division based out of Nagoya, Japan. Toyota created the marque in 1989 to have a more exclusive brand for its premium cars in foreign markets. Lexus started out with the LS and ES sedans before expanding to SUVs, coupes, convertibles and even the occasional supercar. Main rivals include German heavyweights Mercedes-Benz, Audi, and BMW, as well as its Japanese-market foes Infiniti and Acura and American rivals Cadillac and Lincoln.
Lexus is very much part of Toyota, with all that entails. Lexus can be more conservative than its competitors, being slower to react to rends and less frequent with its model upgrades. Lexus can also get eccentric and polarizing with its style; the brand’s current penchant for oversized “spindle grilles” is a prime example.
Lexus durability, however, is legendary; in one famous example, a 1996 LS 400 crossed the million-mile mark in February 2019. And the brand has cache: Hip-hop and country music lyrics frequently reference Lexus due to the cars’ status as a wealth signifier, the name’s alliterative value, and the handy fact that Lexus rhymes with Texas.
How Lexus Names Its Models
On the surface, Lexus employs a simple alphanumeric naming system. The first letter tells you the model. The second letter gives you the body style (S for sedan, C for coupe, X for SUV). The three-digit number denotes the engine displacement (a 2.0-liter engine becomes “200,” 3.0 liters equals “300,” et cetera). An “h” after the three-digit number indicates a hybrid powertrain.
In practice, it can be … not so simple. The model letters — U,L,I,N,G,E,R — have no real meaning and don’t follow alphabetical order for price or status. The three-digit number no longer tracks engine displacement directly. And on some models, the same three-digit number can be used with entirely different engines.
To alleviate the confusion, here’s a reference guide:
