Toyota Land Cruiser: Toyota’s longest-running model line

The Toyota Land Cruiser is a series of four-wheel-drive vehicles produced since 1951 and Toyota’s longest-running model line. It has been sold as a convertible, hardtop, station wagon and cab-chassis, and cumulative sales passed 10 million units in August 2019.

Toyota Land Cruiser at a glance

Based on one source: the English Wikipedia article on the Toyota Land Cruiser. Only one free photograph of a full-size Land Cruiser was available.

History of the Toyota Land Cruiser

Origins

In 1941 the Japanese government asked Toyota to develop a light military truck, after a captured Bantam GP or Willys MB was sent to Japan for study. The prototype Model AK led to the Type 4 compact cargo truck, a half-ton vehicle with an upright grille, flat front wheel arches angled down and back like the later FJ40, headlights above the arches and a folding windscreen. Production AK10s used the 2,259 cc Type C four from the Toyota Model AE saloon with a three-speed manual and a two-speed transfer gearbox. In June 1954, after Willys complained about trademark infringement, Toyota’s technology director Hanji Umehara renamed the vehicle “Land Cruiser”. The postwar BJ was a completely different design that shared no parts with the AK10, although its lessons were applied.

Four branches

Toyota divides the family into four series. The heavy-duty line puts durability and off-road ability first, with flatter steel panels and an almost vertical greenhouse: the BJ, FJ, 20, 40 and 70 series. The station wagon line arrived in 1967 with the 55 series, conceived as a four-wheel drive for a whole family, a format that became the sport utility vehicle; it includes the 55, 60, 80, 100, 200 and 300 series. The light-duty line began with the 70 series wagon and was tuned for Europe with coil springs, smaller and cheaper than the station wagon; from 1990 the 90, 120, 150 and 250 series carried the Prado name in many markets. The fourth branch, the Land Cruiser FJ, was unveiled in October 2025 and went on sale in 2026 below the Prado.

Reputation and markets

The Land Cruiser’s reliability and longevity made it hugely popular, especially in Australia, where it is the best-selling body-on-frame four-wheel drive and Toyota tests it in the outback. It is used by farmers, construction firms, aid organisations, the United Nations and armies, and irregular forces have turned pickups into “technicals”. Since 1990 the smaller Prado has been sold alongside it. As of 2023 the full-size model was unavailable in the United States, Canada, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Macau, South Korea, Brazil and most of Europe, where only Gibraltar, Moldova, Russia, Belarus and Ukraine sold it officially; in America the Prado-based 250 series is now sold simply as the Land Cruiser.

Design and features

• Longest-running Toyota: in production since 1951, with over 10 million sold.
• Four families: heavy-duty, station wagon, light-duty Prado and the new FJ.
• Outback testing: developed and tested in the Australian outback.
• Global workhorse: used by aid agencies, the UN, armies and farmers.

Toyota Land Cruiser versions

• AK10 (1941): the military prototype that preceded the Land Cruiser.
• BJ and FJ (1951): the first postwar Land Cruisers.
• 40 series (1960): the classic short-wheelbase off-roader.
• 55 series (1967): the first station wagon Land Cruiser.
• 70 series: the heavy-duty line still in production.
• Prado: the light-duty branch from 1990.
• Land Cruiser FJ (2026): a smaller model on the Hilux IMV platform.

The 40 series has its own article, the Land Cruiser (J40), and the light-duty branch is covered with the Prado. The FJ Cruiser revived the old style, and more cars are in the Toyota collection.

Sources

• Toyota Land Cruiser, English Wikipedia: origins, branches, markets