2026 Lexus RX Hybrid Reviews, Pricing & Specs

Lexus aims for high style with the RX 500h F Sport Performance, and perhaps overshoots the target with sometimes excessive flair.

The controversy is all in the nose, where Lexus eschews its “spindle” grille for a large, black, trapezoidal item, flanked by slim headlights up top and air intakes down low. The hood bends down into the grille like a misshapen nose, and the Lexus L logo sits at the top. The whole face borders on over-stylized.

The profile doesn’t try as hard, but it's still stylish. Flat flares surround each wheel, a character line that rises from the back of the front door to the rear wheel gives a sense of motion, and the floating roofline suggests a fastback shape that resolves into a rear spoiler. It sits on 21-inch wheels in black or dark gray, and the rear has a full-width taillight above lower fog lights that sit below housings to echo the front air intakes. Dark trim on the window surrounds and black mirrors adds a sporty look.

Inside, the RX 500h is offered with Dark Graphite or Rioja Red leather. The red adds a decidedly sporty element, as do the perforated leather-wrapped steering wheel and aluminum pedals. The driver sits in front of a pair of digital screens and is surrounded by soft-touch materials.

The RX 500h equals the power of some luxury crossover-SUV rivals but goes about it in a different way. It doesn’t use a turbocharged V6 to crank out its 366 horsepower and 406 pound-feet of torque. Instead, it goes with a four-cylinder engine and a hybrid system to make decent power balanced by good but not great fuel economy.

The engine is a turbocharged 2.4-liter four-cylinder that generates 271 horsepower, and two electric motors account for the remaining 95 hp. The front motor sits between the engine and the six-speed automatic transmission, and the rear motor is part of an eAxle that gives the RX 500h all-wheel drive (AWD). This is a different system than the base RX 350h, which uses a 2.5-liter naturally aspirated four-cylinder engine and does without a conventional geared transmission. It still has AWD, but is rated at just 246 hp and 233 lb-ft of torque.

Go easy from a stop and only the front and rear motors provide the acceleration. Dig deeper into the throttle and the engine joins in, and that tops out with full power from both motors. Sport mode, however, keeps the engine on at all times.

The motors, the engine, and the transmission work well together. The hand-off from electric to gas propulsion is seamless, and the power steps up through the gears thanks to the traditional automatic transmission, rather than arriving in the slushy way of most Toyota/Lexus hybrids (including the F Sport Performance’s RX 350h sibling) which rely on the electric motors and a planetary gearset in lieu of a conventional transmission.

It’s fairly strong, too. Lexus quotes a 5.9-second 0-60 mph time, which feels about right based on our drive. While that’s a good number, it's almost two seconds slower than a BMW X3 M50 xDrive. Steering-wheel shift paddles allow drivers to downshift to tap into more power when desired, and the transmission offers smooth shifts. The power is accompanied by a synthetic whirr, much like the sound of various electric vehicles. It’s more pronounced and deeper in Sport mode, and can be turned off to allow the turbo-four to sing its muffled, slightly coarse tune.

Lexus gives the RX 500h Sport Performance standard adaptive dampers, rear-axle steering, and a firmer suspension than other RX models. The front brakes are also larger, with 15.7-inch rotors and six-piston calipers versus 13.4 inches with two-piston calipers on other models. It’s all set on rather large 21-inch wheels with 235/50R21 Bridgestone Alenza Sport A/S tires.

That equipment makes the RX 500h F Sport Performance firmer but not much sportier. The steering is direct but not overly quick and lacks feel. The all-season tires don’t have much grip, but the rear-axle steering helps to keep the vehicle stable in corners. With 8.1 inches of ground clearance, the SUV leans in turns; the dampers’ Sport setting helps to combat that, but at the cost of rendering the traditionally smooth ride overly firm. The ride gets busy on bumpy roads and sharp ruts pound through.

Lexus provides a Custom mode that allows drivers to choose the suspension, powertrain, steering, and air conditioning settings. We recommend going with the Sport settings for the powertrain and steering but not the dampers, and for a truly sporty experience, buyers will be better served by the BMW X3, the Audi SQ5, or the Mercedes-AMG GLC 43.

The ride may not always be comfortable, but the RX’s interior is. Front-seat occupants get eight-way power-adjustable sport seats with standard heating and cooling and, though thickly bolstered for good support, the seats have enough room for larger frames. The steering wheel is also heated, and a panoramic sunroof comes standard.

The rear seats also have good legroom, even for larger adults, though shoehorning three adults back there will make them rather uncomfortable. The seat cushions sit high enough to make for a comfortable position on long trips.

With the second row up, the RX 500h has a useful 29.6 cubic feet of cargo space. Fold those seats down via power controls in the second row or the cargo area and there are 46.2 cubic feet of space, which is small for the class. The X3, for example, has 67.1 cubic feet of cargo space.

The RX 500h is fitted with a 12.3-inch digital instrument cluster and a 14-inch touchscreen, along with a standard head-up display. The infotainment system includes wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, as well as Lexus Intelligent Assist that allows drivers to use voice commands by saying “Hey Lexus.” Wireless phone charging is also standard.

The touchscreen is tilted toward the driver and it reacts quickly to touch inputs. It’s a far cry from the previous Lexus system that used an awkward, mouse-like controller. However, the steering wheel’s four-way touch-sensitive pads are frustrating, because they control the head-up display information and position, the cruise control settings, and the information displayed in the digital instrument cluster, and figuring out how to get to the desired function is often distracting.

Lexus also provides a useful three-year Drive Connect subscription with Google points of interest and real-time traffic information.

Lexus equips the RX 500h with its Lexus Safety System+ 3.0 suite of active safety features, which includes forward-collision warning, automatic emergency braking with pedestrian detection and intersection assist, adaptive cruise control, lane-keep assist, high-beam assist, traffic-sign recognition, and emergency steering assist. Also standard are front and rear parking sensors, blind-spot monitors, and rear cross-traffic alert. Options include automatic parking, remote automatic parking, a surround-view camera system, and traffic-jam assist, which includes front cross-traffic alert and lane-change assist.

The RX gets generally good crash-test ratings with one exception—it earns a perfect five-star rating from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), but it doesn’t fare so well in Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) testing. It gets top “Good” ratings in all IIHS tests except for the updated moderate front overlap test, where it scores a “Poor” rating. That keeps it from earning a Top Safety Pick or Top Safety Pick+ award.

The RX comes with the right safety features and they all worked well during our test drive. However, as we mentioned earlier, we wish the touch-sensitive steering-wheel buttons for the cruise control were easier to understand.

The RX 500h F Sport Performance starts at $67,650 including a $1,450 destination charge. That’s quite a lot when it can’t match the similarly priced X3 M50 or Mercedes-AMG GLC 43 for power.

In addition to the aforementioned features, it comes standard with LED headlights and fog lights, dual-zone automatic climate control, a power tilt/telescoping steering column, driver’s seat memory, ambient lighting, roof rails, and a 12-speaker audio system. That, along with the added power, at least helps to justify the RX 500h’s premium over the RX 350h hybrid, which starts at $54,925 with destination.

The main strength of the RX 500h’s hybrid system versus turbocharged six-cylinder rivals is fuel economy. The EPA rates it at 27 mpg city, 28 mpg highway, and 27 mpg combined. In our experience, that requires a light throttle, as we averaged just 18.4 mpg over 120 miles of mixed and sometimes spirited driving.

Nonetheless, it seems like an eight-speed automatic with taller overdrive gears and smaller wheels could give the RX 500h better fuel economy. Maybe Lexus should consider expanding the RX 500h lineup to include non F Sport trims with those smaller wheels to improve both fuel economy and ride quality, without asking customers to trade down to the less-powerful RX 350h.