Face-lifted 2026 Lexus ES Bows In China

Bowing at Auto Guangzhou 2024 expo late last week, the seventh-gen Lexus ES has received a second facelift treatment.

The seventh-generation Lexus ES executive saloon just received a second facelift and bowed late last week during the Auto Guangzhou 2024 show in China. Besides a slew of aesthetic tweaks, the ES also gained minor tech upgraded aboard, however its range of powertrains remain unchanged.

We’ll kick things off with the aesthetic revisions, the most obvious of which are evident up front as the Lexus ES now rocks a new rendition of the signature Lexus spindle grille with octagonal inserts, revised bumper air intakes, and redesigned LED headlights featuring new dual-L lighting pattern.

Key changes can be seen up front through the new grille, headlights and revised bumper. Changes at the rear are more subtle in contrast to the front's.

Changes are also seen in the rear fascia, albeit more subtly, where the double-L light motif is repeated in the revised taillights that also gained a new full-width LED light bar connecting both sides. Gone here too the brand’s ‘L’ badge, which has been replaced with a new ‘Lexus’ script badge instead.

Moving into the cabin and the face-lifted 2026 model year version sees a new centre stack adopted to accommodate a new and larger touchscreen infotainment unit – up from 12.3 inches to 14 inches now. Said interface also boasts dual rotary dials for the climate control and other vehicle functions.

On board, the centre stack, gear selector lever, central air vents and infotainment are new, the latter having been upsized to 14 inches now.

Also refashioned here are the central air vents in the dash’s lower half, followed by a new gear selector lever design that Lexus claims was styled to meet demands of a younger-aged crop of buyers in China. Apart form which, little else has changed with the ES’ cabin.

Retained too are a slew of familiar bits like the 7-inch digital instrumentation, bamboo or walnut wood cabin trims, semi-aniline leather-wrapped power-adjustable seats with memory, heating and ventilation functions, heated rear seats, panoramic glass sunroof, active noise cancellation, tri-zone automatic climate control, wireless charging pad, and the 17-speaker Mark Levinson audio suite.

On the safety front, the face-lifted 2026 Lexus ES continues to see 10 airbags lining its cabin, and it still offers the LSS ADAS package too.

As for safety, this refreshed Lexus ES continues to feature the Lexus Safety System (LSS) advanced driver assistance system (ADAS) package that brings adaptive cruise control with stop-go function and curve speed reduction, autonomous emergency braking, lane centering assist, evasive steering assist, blind spot monitor and rear cross-traffic alert – all coming on top of 10 airbags.

Under the hood, the Chinese market version shown late last week remains unchanged and still sees the base ES200 variant employ a 2.0-litre direct-injected 4-cyl petrol mill rated at 173 PS and 206 NM driving the front wheels via a CVT automatic box.

For China, the ES also retains its familiar 2.0-litre 4-cyl petrol and 2.5-litre-4-cyl petrol hybrid powertrain choices.

Further up the range sees the ES300h, and this guise also retains its familiar petrol hybrid package comprised of a 2.5-litre Atkinson Cycle 4-cyl petrol mill with 178 PS and 221 NM outputs paired with a pair of e-motors rated at 120 PS and 202 NM, as well as an e-CVT transmission, altogether outputting a combined output of 218 PS. 

Beyond China, we can perhaps expect to see Lexus offer this new face-lifted version of the ES in other markets soon enough.

Closer to home, Lexus Malaysia (UMW Toyota Motor) still markets the current-gen ES in ES250 Premium, ES250 Luxury and ES250 F Sport guises priced from RM320,999, RM256,888 and RM371888 respectively.