Toyota GR Supra to finally get manual transmission

Car enthusiasts can be often seen posting the hashtag #savethemanual, but it is rare to see car manufacturers doing such. Especially for mass-market brands such as Toyota.

In line with its CEO Akio Toyoda promising "No more boring cars" and ethos to "never stop challenging to make ever-better cars". Toyota has finally answered the call of performance driving enthusiasts with a manual transmission version of the Toyota GR Supra sports car.

A three-pedal teaser was Tweeted by Toyota USA with the hashtags #Supra and #Manual, which was followed by an official release by Toyota UK and Toyota EU.

Frankly, we were not all too surprised by this as Toyota Chief Engineer Tetsuya Tada already hinted of the possibility back in 2019. Most readers chose "manual transmission" as well.

The manual transmission version GR Supra sports cars will feature a new red Supra trunk badge to distinguish the car as having a "highly desirable, pure, and special feature".

"Toyota Gazoo Racing sports car customers and fans have spoken and we’ve listened. A Toyota GR Supra with an all-new, tailor-made manual transmission is coming soon," confirmed Toyota in an official press release.

"Developed to meet the demands of driving purists, the Toyota GR Supra Manual Transmission has been engineered to offer enthusiasts something that is closer to the Gazoo Racing DNA and will enhance the driving experience," it added.

Toyota has said it will reveal more information in the coming weeks, various reports have hinted the launch to be in late April.

BMW has not yet hinted nor announced whether it will offer a similar gearbox for its Z4 convertible, with which the Supra shares its platform.

But the most important question is, will Toyota Motor Philippines make it available for our market?