Honda today issued its latest global teasers for the returning Prelude, due to be officially unveiled in full from September.
Alongside the worldwide announcement, Honda Australia finally confirmed the new Prelude will be coming to local showrooms, locking in a due date of mid-2026 for the hybrid four-seat coupe.
“We’re thrilled to add this iconic nameplate to the Honda line up next year,” Robert Thorp, Director of Automotive at Honda Australia, said in a media statement.
“Prelude taps into a rare combination of nostalgia and performance with broad appeal across generations of Honda customers, old and new.”
While we don’t yet know full specifications of the Prelude, last week Honda’s US division confirmed it will get parts from the high-performance Civic Type R, such as wider front and rear tracks, Honda’s unique dual-axis front suspension design (the first time it’ll appear on a non-Type R model), as well as six-piston Brembo front brake calipers.
Powering the Prelude will be a 2.0-litre hybrid powertrain, as found in the Civic which produces 135kW and 315Nm. Unlike previous iterations it won’t be available as a manual, however its electric continuously variable transmission (e-CVT) will adopt a ‘Honda S+ Shift system’, simulating gear changes as if it was using a traditional, multi-ratio automatic.
It’ll be somewhat of a niche product when it comes to Australia, as the only other sports coupe and convertible rivals in Australia are all rear-wheel drive, such as the Toyota GR86 and its Subaru BRZ twin, as well as the Mazda MX-5.
The local market for cars such as the Prelude – officially defined as sports cars under $70,000 – is experiencing mixed results and is impacted by ebbs and flows in deliveries, however as a whole it accounts for just one per cent of Australia’s new vehicle mix.
Meanwhile, Honda has been facing its own struggles in Australia. After switching to fixed prices and a controversial ‘agency model’ in mid-2021, Honda posted its worst annual sales on record in 2023 with just 13,734 deliveries.
It rebounded slightly to 14,092 deliveries in 2024, however it’s a far cry from its record of 60,529 deliveries in 2007, and even 51,525 as recently as 2018.
In the first half of 2025, Honda’s deliveries were down 7.3 per cent compared to the same period last year, with 8068 new vehicles finding homes. Much of the slight recent uplift has been attributed to the ZR-V, which joined the CR-V and HR-V in Honda’s crucial SUV range.
Of the brand’s 8068 deliveries between January and June, 7566 were of its SUVs. In the same six-month period, it delivered just 442 Civics and 60 Accords, both down almost 30 per cent on last year.
Given the Prelude’s even more niche position as a sports car – and a hybrid front-wheel drive one at that – Honda could be hoping for a miracle if it wants to arrest its sales chart slide amid rising competition from China.
Based on the previous performance of the CR-Z, another front-wheel drive hybrid coupe (though one that was manual), Honda may have cause for concern, given it only sold 591 examples between 2011 and 2015.
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