2023 Toyota 4Runner Gets Eye-Catching 40th Anniversary Special Edition
Toyota is celebrating the 40th anniversary of its rugged 4Runner SUV with a special model featuring genuinely inspired tri-colored stripes inspired by its early success in off-road racing. The yellow-orange-red body graphics give a strong retro vibe while also providing excellent contrast with the black bodywork — though it’s available in white and red as well.
It has bronze-colored 17-inch wheels and exterior badging along with a body-color-matching heritage grille. Inside, it features exclusive badging on the center console, bronze-colored stitching and cross-stitching on the shift knob, a standard power moonroof, and 40th Anniversary logos on the seats and floormats.
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Only 4040 examples of the 2023 Toyota 4Runner 40th Anniversary Special Edition will be made, and these will feature a special plaque on the dashboard indicating their number. It has those same tri-color stripes and bronze coloring as the vehicle itself, which we think is a nice touch and looks really cool.
It’s easy to poke fun at the automaker for leaving the 4Runner largely unchanged for 13 of those past 40 years (the current-gen model was unveiled in Sept. 2009) but Toyota certainly has no qualms about honoring the past, and the 4Runner arguably needs few updates.
The 4Runner feels like a remnant of a previous age, one with naturally aspirated V6 engines, five-speed automatic transmissions, and boxy body-on-frame construction. But old is not necessarily bad, as this capable SUV routinely proves. According to iSeeCars.com, the 4Runner is the fifth most likely vehicle on the road to hit 200,000 miles.
That’s probably in part because of Toyota’s reliability wizardry but also precisely because the 4Runner is relatively mechanically simple — not to mention it’s built to take a beating. With nearly 10 inches of ground clearance
Kurt Verlin was born in France and lives in the United States. Throughout his life he was always told French was the language of romance, but it was English he fell in love with. He likes cats, music, cars, 30 Rock, Formula 1, and pretending to be a race car driver in simulators; but most of all, he just likes to write about it all. See more articles by Kurt.