This is the new 2025 Honda Civic Hybrid for USA - Riding the demand wave to hit 40% sales contribution
Hans · Jan 19, 2024 09:37 PM
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It’s previewed one year ahead of its market launch, but American Honda Motor showed it anyway. This is the new mildly facelifted 2025 Honda Civic.
The model shown here is a North American market model, so there will still be some minor differences from our Malaysian market model, especially the headlamps. North American market models have amber lenses, to comply with local regulations.
Compared to the current, outgoing model, the 2025 Honda Civic has a rather Acura-esque front grille and bumper. Behind, the new Civic appears to remain unchanged.
The main highlight for the North American market is the addition of a hybrid variant. For us, a Civic e:HEV hybrid is not news but oddly enough, the Civic hybrid is not available there, even though the region buys more hybrids and Civics than any other region.
Unlike here, Honda hybrid models sold in USA and Canada don’t wear the e:HEV badge. Instead, the Civic Hybrid has a blue hybrid badge, similar to earlier i-DCD era generation Honda hybrid models sold here.
Honda adds that the Civic Hybrid will be available in both sedan and hatchback body styles.
2025 Honda Civic (above) and current model year Civic (below). North American market model shown
Honda expects the Civic Hybrid to contribute 40 percent of the model’s total sales in North America. While BEV models are getting the attention, what’s less said is that hybrid sales in USA surged 76 percent between January to November 2023, and unlike BEV models, the numbers for hybrids are coming from an already very mature, high-volume base where double digit growth is difficult to achieve.
Hybrid sales hit a record high of over 1 million units in the first 11 months of 2023. The figure doesn’t include another 148,000 units of plug-in hybrids sold there in the same 11-month period.
The current FE generation Honda Civic debuted in USA in April 2021, before going on sale in June that year. Sales in other regions followed later, with right-hand drive Thailand launching in August 2021, followed by Malaysia in January 2022.
If you’ve been keeping count, there’s a circa 9 months gap between a Honda model’s market launch in USA and Malaysia. This is to be expected, since our local tax structure require a certain amount of locally sourced parts before it can qualify for excise tax rebates. Before a new model is phased in, Honda Malaysia’s Pegoh plant will need to be re-tooled, while suppliers need to get up to speed in manufacturing the new parts.
Assuming the new Honda Civic goes on sale in USA in the first quarter of 2025, Thailand – which serves as the region’s ‘mother plant’, setting the pace and sharing best practices with Malaysia – can be expected to launch it by the second quarter. You can estimate Honda Malaysia to launch the new Honda Civic by end-2025.
Malaysian market Civic, note the clear lense turn signals
Currently, Honda Malaysia sells the Honda Civic is priced as below:
Over 15 years of experience in automotive, from product planning, to market research, to print and digital media. Garages a 6-cylinder manual RWD but buses to work.
