The long-awaited new Toyota MR2 will use the company’s new 2.0-liter turbo four. Toyota is running a mid-engined GR Yaris in races to iron out any issues. The car’s design will be heavily based on the FT-Se concept from 2023. Toyota is well into the development of an all-new MR2, and the brand is using Japan’s grueling Super Taikyu endurance series as the proving ground for its next generation of performance cars. A launch date remains a mystery, but the MR2 won’t arrive alone. An an all-new Celica is reportedly coming too, and together with the Supra and GR GT, that gives Toyota a genuine four-car sports lineup. Getting the mid-engined layout right has taken time. Toyota has spent more than 18 months sorting out how to build the car properly, and there’s history weighing on the effort. The original MR2 was mid-engined as well, but it earned a reputation for snap oversteer that could bite the unwary. This time, Toyota wants the handling to be sharp without the sting. Read: Mid-Engine GR Yaris Is Back On Track As Toyota Tries To Shrink 2.0 Turbo A special version of the GR Yaris, known as the Concept M, is helping bring the MR2 to life. It’s competed in several races over the last year, most recently at an event at Fuji Speedway, where it qualified second and completed 473 laps, Auto Express reports. As noted by Toyota chairman Akio Toyoda, motorsport serves as an important proving ground for all of the brand’s performance cars. Honed Through Racing Illustrations: Thanos Pappas for CarScoops “If we don’t challenge [ourselves in motorsport] maybe we don’t fail, but if we challenge, then maybe we fail,” Toyoda said. “If we decided to make such a car in a meeting, it would never exist.” At the heart of the Concept M, and the new MR2, will be Toyota’s newly developed 2.0-liter turbocharged G20E four-cylinder. This engine is expected to replace the 1.6-liter turbocharged three-cylinder found in the GR Yaris and GR Corolla and should easily deliver around 400 hp in base specification. In racing guise, it can be tuned to produce 500 hp. Through intensive testing with the Concept M, Toyota has concluded that pairing the mid-engine layout with all-wheel drive, rather than rear-wheel drive, is the best way to achieve its performance objectives. According to Toyota GR engineering boss Naohiko Saito, “this layout is new for us, but we have found in our initial testing that the combination of an all-wheel-drive mid-ship layout offers the best layout for high-performance driving.” In the MR2, this engine will be mounted transversely and likely coupled to the same eight-speed automatic transmission offered in the GR Yaris and GR Corolla. Concept Car Looks Toyota’s mid-engined Concept M As Toyota has yet to start testing prototypes of the new MR2 with production-ready bodywork, we don’t know what it will look like. However, the prevailing view is that it will be very similar to the Toyota FT-Se concept from 2023, offering dimensions similar to the Lotus Emira but with sharper angles and a more aggressive, in-your-face design. In late 2025, Toyota filed to trademark the GR MR2 and GR MR-S names in Japan, adding further credence to the fact that the car’s revival is just around the corner. Just a couple of days later, it also filed to trademark the GR MR-S name in Australia.