Honda Brings Acura Into BEV Fold With 2024 ZDX

Honda develops the '24 Acura ZDX and ZDX Type S performance vehicle to launch the premium brand’s battery-electric-vehicle future. The emission-free ZDX builds on the Acura Precision EV Concept shown in August during Monterey Car Week in California.

The ZDX is being co-developed with General Motors utilizing the highly flexible global BEV platform powered by Ultium batteries. Acura then will launch additional BEV models starting in 2026 based on the company’s own global e:Architecture.

“The Acura ZDX represents the start to what will be an accelerated path toward electrification by the end of the decade and the key role the Acura brand will play in our company’s global goal to achieve carbon neutrality in 2050,” says Emile Korkor, assistant vice president of Acura National Sales. “Acura will remain focused on performance in the electrified era and Type S will continue to represent the pinnacle of this direction.” 

Honda’s BEV plan calls for 40% of its North American offerings, including Acura vehicles­, to be electric or hydrogen-powered by 2030, and 80% by 2035. Globally Honda says it will have 30 BEVs and FCEVs by 2030.

Honda was a pioneer along with Toyota almost a quarter-century ago with hybrid vehicles. It launched the Honda Insight before Toyota introduced the Prius. But it was the Prius that grew quickly and defined the category. Honda has tinkered with its hybrid strategy with mixed results since, including the Honda Accord Hybrid, which picked up Wards 10 Best Engines & Propulsion Systems honors in 2017 and 2020, and the CR-V Hybrid. But it has stayed mostly on the sidelines when it comes to BEVs.

The company launched the Clarity EV in California and Oregon in 2017, but its 89-mile (143-km) range doomed it when compared with Tesla models already on the market. The hydrogen-fuel-cell version of the Clarity has been restricted to California sales and has been largely an experimental vehicle because of the limited refueling infrastructure.

Honda is pursuing both BEVs and hydrogen fuel cells. It will launch the Prologue BEV SUV for the '24 model year as its first all-electric vehicle in wide distribution. And it will launch in limited supply a hydrogen-fuel-cell CR-V CUV in 2024.