NEW YORK – Infiniti launches the all-new ’25 QX80 this summer, a massive, long, tall, 3-row SUV crammed with electronic features that’s also a warm embrace for internal-combustion engines.
Jose Roman, senior vice president and global head of Infiniti, calls the QX80 redesign the “best car” Infiniti has ever built. Not incidentally, Roman is also senior vice president, Global Sales, Nissan Motor Co., which means the Infiniti luxury brand always has a seat at the parent company head table.
His favorite feature in the new Infiniti QX80? The engine, a twin-turbo, 3.5L V-6 that generates 450 hp at 5,600 rpm, and a robust 516 lb.ft. (700 Nm) of torque, at just 3,600 rpm, which Roman says is especially good for towing.
“That engine is the best engine ever produced in the company,” Roman tells WardsAuto in an interview here the morning after a high-profile, rooftop unveiling. “I can only compare it to the engine in the GT-R.”
Visually, the 2024 Nissan GT-R – a low-slung, 2-door sports car – couldn’t be more different.
But there are some similarities: The sports car has a slightly bigger, twin-turbo 3.8L V-6 and a starting price of $122,985. QX80 in Autograph trim stickers at $122,500, pushing the top end of the Infiniti range upscale and nudging the entire Infiniti brand image upscale, too. The QX80 starts at $84,445 for the “Pure” trim and equipment package (prices include $1,995 destination and handling).
Infiniti estimates the price increase from a typically equipped ’24 model to a typically equipped model of the redesigned ’25 model is about $8,000, or around 12%.
Money alone is not going to deter people who can afford it, says California dealer Steve Lapin, chairman of the Infiniti National Dealer Advisory Board, and the owner of Infiniti of Thousand Oaks, in the city of the same name.
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“We will attract a new customer,” in addition to loyal Infiniti customers, Lapin says in an interview at the premiere. “This car is as good as – better, really – than the competition, considering what this car has; the styling, the interior, the panache,” Lapin says.
At the QX80’s media coming-out party, Alfonso Albaisa, Infiniti Global Design senior vice president, joked that he might run out of things to say in the time it took to walk from the front to the back of the big SUV.
Cool interior features include personalized ambient lighting, which comes in 64 colors; optional heated and cooled seats for the first two rows, and optional heated seats for the third row; so-called Biometric Cooling, which can automatically turn the temperature up or down, if it senses the occupants are too hot or too cold; two 14.3-in. (36-cm) displays.
The exterior styling is a little reminiscent of a curvier Land Rover Range Rover. Albaisa compares the segmented, rectangular front and rear exterior lights to “piano keys.”
One thing the 2025 QX80 doesn’t offer is a hybrid powertrain, nor an all-electric one, at least not at launch. Roman says electrification will come, but today’s QX80 customers are asking for internal-combustion power.
“Infiniti will be there with electrification, but we will be there when the market is more mature,” he says.
Roman stresses that the ’25 QX80 is the first of four notable launches for the brand. Coming are the QX65, a coupe-styled 4-door CUV based on the QX60; and two BEVs, a sedan based on the Vision Qe Concept and a crossover based on the Vision QXe Concept.
