Toyota is bringing back the Scion name to sell Americans a tiny Japanese-style kei truck. The first vehicle under the new Scion by Toyota brand, the KEI-01, is an ultra-compact utility truck due in the United States in the second half of 2027, Toyota Motor North America said in an announcement on its US newsroom.
The company unveiled the brand on November 9 at simultaneous events in Ypsilanti Township, Michigan, and Frisco, Texas, describing it as “a new brand built around curiosity, possibility and the freedom to explore mobility in new ways.”
What the KEI-01 is
A kei truck is a pickup built to Japan’s light-vehicle rules, which since 1998 cap length at 3.4 meters (11.2 feet), width at 1.48 meters (4.9 feet) and engine size at 660 cc. The cab sits over the front wheels to free up bed space, and fold-down bed sides are common. Japan’s first kei truck went on sale in 1959.
The KEI-01 is a rebadged Daihatsu Hijet that will be built in the United States to meet local rules and sold to companies as a fleet vehicle rather than to private buyers. Daihatsu is a Toyota subsidiary, and Toyota already sells the same truck in Japan as the Pixis Truck.
Further details come from a report on the launch event and have not appeared in Toyota’s summary. According to that report, the KEI-01 has a 660 cc engine, a CVT gearbox, four-wheel drive and standard heating and air conditioning. It carries about 600 pounds of payload, counting passengers, and has a bed that folds down on three sides. The truck is said to be certified as a US low-speed vehicle, which would limit it to under 25 mph and to roads posted below 35 mph. The same report says Toyota will use its existing manufacturing base in Indiana and start with a low-volume fleet pilot.
How it compares
That low-speed rating is the big trade-off. An unrestricted kei truck can reach about 120 km/h (75 mph), so a 25 mph cap means the KEI-01 would run at about one-third of the class’s usual top speed. The reported 600-pound payload is also below the typical kei bed rating of 350 kg (about 770 pounds), roughly 170 pounds less.
What Toyota gains is a factory-backed version of a truck Americans already buy secondhand. Kei vehicles older than 25 years can be imported into the US with few restrictions, and more than 30,000 kei trucks were brought in between 2020 and January 2026. Farms, campuses, golf courses, landscapers and delivery firms are among their common US users.
A familiar name returns
Scion was Toyota’s youth-focused brand from 2003 until it was retired in 2016. The revived label is pitched as an experimental arm, and two concepts sit alongside the KEI-01: an off-road side-by-side first shown at the 2025 SEMA Show and a compact outdoor personal mobility concept. Neither has a sales date.
Toyota has been in Badiyaa’s car coverage this autumn for a different reason, an owner who got a free new engine under the Tundra V6 recall, and US regulators are also rethinking how unusual vehicles are marked on public roads, as with the proposed cyan lights for driverless cars.
For now the date is the headline fact: the first KEI-01 trucks are due in the second half of 2027.
Further reading
Image: TTTNIS, CC0 via Wikimedia Commons
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