Hyundai Is Coming For The Ford Ranger And Chevy Colorado With A Midsize Pickup

Hyundai’s first foray into the U.S. pickup truck market with the Santa Cruz hasn’t sold well enough to put a lot of fear in its competitors, but it’s been taking notes.

Hyundai CEO José Muñoz announced during the automaker’s investor day event in New York that it will soon be launching a midsize pickup.

Muñoz said the compact Santa Cruz brought it experience in the segment and brand presence in the segment that it will now be leveraging for the new model.

“Pickup trucks represent a white space opportunity we are ready to capture,” Muñoz said, adding that an SUV could also be built on the platform.

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Details weren’t shared, but Muñoz confirmed that it will be a body-on-frame truck like the Ford Ranger, Chevrolet Colorado and top selling Toyota Tacoma, while the Santa Cruz is based on the Hyundai Tucson crossover SUV.

Hyundai and General Motors are already collaborating on a midsize pickup for the Central American and South American markets, but Muñoz did not suggest this was related to that or not an in-house Hyundai project.

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The truck will almost certainly be built in North America to avoid the longstanding 25% “chicken tax” on pickups imported from other regions along with the latest import tariffs being imposed on virtually every country. Production is expected to begin before 2030.

Hyundai doesn’t currently have a truck factory in the U.S., but it has several assembly plants and is currently expanding its annual capacity to more than 1.2 million vehicles.

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The Tacoma is the best-selling midsize truck by far with 130,873 delivered in the first half of 2025. That was followed by the Chevrolet Colorado (52,815), the Ford Ranger (32,977), the Nissan Frontier (30,598), the Jeep Gladiator (25,400), the Honda Ridgeline (24,281) and the GMC Canyon (18,339).

Hyundai delivered 14,221 Santa Cruzes, which was second to the Ford Ranger’s 86,056 in a two-model small pickup segment.