What is Toyota?

Who makes Toyota

Toyota Motor Corporation is a Japanese multinational automaker headquartered in Toyota City, Aichi Prefecture. Founded by Kiichiro Toyoda in 1937 as a spinoff from Toyoda Automatic Loom Works, Toyota became the world's largest automaker by production volume in 2008 and has held that position for most years since. The Toyota Production System, developed by Taiichi Ohno after World War II, introduced just-in-time manufacturing and jidoka (automation with a human touch) and now serves as the template studied by lean-manufacturing programs worldwide. Toyota pioneered mass-market hybrid powertrains with the Prius in 1997, has sold more than 25 million electrified vehicles globally, and operates production facilities on every populated continent. The Camry has been the best-selling passenger car in the United States in 22 of the past 25 years, and the Tacoma and Tundra represent Toyota's mid-size and full-size pickup entries. Lexus, Toyota's luxury division, has been a separate brand since 1989. Toyota trades on the New York Stock Exchange under TM and on the Tokyo Stock Exchange as 7203. Recall information for every Toyota VIN is reported to NHTSA, and EPA fuel-economy ratings, IIHS crash-test results and J.D. Power dependability studies provide third-party benchmarks. ForCar.org decodes any Toyota VIN against the same NHTSA dataset to surface trim, options, recalls and original MSRP.

Kiichiro Toyoda founded the automotive division of Toyoda Automatic Loom Works in 1933, and the company was spun off as Toyota Motor Co. in 1937. The first passenger car was the Model AA. After near-bankruptcy in 1949, Eiji Toyoda and Taiichi Ohno developed the Toyota Production System, the basis for modern lean manufacturing. The 1989 launch of Lexus and the 1997 launch of the Prius hybrid established Toyota as a benchmark for both quality and electrification.

Technology it is known for: Toyota Hybrid System (THS II), Toyota Safety Sense, Multi-Stage Hybrid (Lexus shared), Dynamic Force engines, e-CVT transmission.

This page covers Toyota Motor Corporation, the Japanese automaker — not the city of Toyota or the Toyoda family loom business.

Where Toyota cars are actually built

A badge says where a company is registered, not where its cars were bolted together. The first three characters of any VIN — the world manufacturer identifier — say the second thing, and that is what we counted: 87,979 vehicles on record, 56 distinct manufacturer codes.

Read your own: the first character is the region, the first three together identify the plant's manufacturer. A Toyota beginning 4T1 was assembled in the United States.

All Toyota models 43

Every Toyota model we track, grouped by body type. Click any model for its VIN decoder, recalls, MPG, safety and ForCar Reliability Score — broken down by year.

Toyota SUVs & crossovers 10

Toyota Cars & sedans 22

Toyota Trucks 3

Toyota Minivans & vans 2

Toyota Wagons 1

Toyota More models 5

Toyota by the numbers

What the federal records say about the marque. Each line links to the full breakdown by model and year.

Toyota hybrids & electric models

Toyota's electrified lineup — 19 hybrids and 4 electric / plug-in. Click any model for its full powertrain, MPG and range by year.

Toyota hybrids 19

Toyota electric & plug-in 4

Electrified variants from EPA fueleconomy.gov powertrain data. A model may offer gas, hybrid and electric versions across years.

How to read a Toyota VIN

Every Toyota built since 1981 carries a unique 17-character VIN (Vehicle Identification Number). It encodes where and when the vehicle was made, its engine and body — here's what each part means:

The remaining digits — engine (8th), model-year letter (10th) and plant — follow the universal SAE standard. Our VIN decoder breaks all seventeen positions down — year codes, country of assembly and the plant that built the car.

Who owns Toyota, and what you get

Toyota is independent, Japanese-owned and publicly listed as TM. Toyota competes across every mainstream passenger segment and is the volume leader in compact and mid-size sedans, hybrid crossovers and body-on-frame SUVs. The brand's reputation centers on long-term reliability and resale value, supported by J.D. Power dependability rankings. Toyota's electrification strategy emphasizes hybrids and plug-in hybrids alongside battery-electric models such as the bZ4X, in contrast with EV-only competitors.

⚠ Worth knowing before you rely on it: across our complaint records the typical car reaches the halfway point of its faults at five years, while basic cover here runs 3 years / 36,000 miles. See when Toyota models actually start to break →