I’ve watched Toyota’s modern performance story peak with the GR Corolla’s wild three-cylinder and now start to bend toward something more conventional, and more expensive. As the brand prepares to move away from that tiny 1.6-liter powerhouse, the current cars are quietly turning into future collectibles, with prices and demand already reflecting the shift. If you’ve ever thought about owning this oddball hero, the window where it’s merely “expensive” instead of “unobtainable” is closing fast.
How Toyota’s 3-Cylinder Became Modern Legend
When I look at the GR Corolla’s spec sheet, it still reads like a dare: a compact hatchback built around a 1.6-liter inline-three that punches out 300 horsepower. That engine, known as the G16E-GTS, turned a humble Corolla into a rally-bred street car and instantly became the centerpiece of Toyota’s so-called golden era of enthusiast machines. The appeal wasn’t just the number; it was the audacity of squeezing that kind of output from three cylinders and pairing it with a manual gearbox and all-wheel drive, a combination that made the car feel like a homologation special you could actually buy.
That sense of audacity is exactly why the engine’s looming demise matters so much. Reporting on Toyota’s next steps makes it clear that the company is already preparing newly developed engines for the next generation of Corolla, a move that directly threatens the GR’s turbo three as the centerpiece of the lineup. When I connect that with the way the car was introduced—an all-wheel-drive hatch with a 300-horsepower three-cylinder built to punch above its weight—it’s obvious that this powerplant isn’t just another engine option. It’s the defining feature that turned a commuter nameplate into a cult performance icon.
The New Turbo Four and the End of an Era
The clearest sign that Toyota’s golden-era weirdness is fading is the company’s pivot toward a new turbocharged four-cylinder for future Corollas. Instead of doubling down on the G16E-GTS, Toyota is developing a fresh family of engines that will underpin the next generation of the car, including its performance variants. Coverage of the brand’s plans around the 2025 Japan Motor show describes how Toyota is lining up this new hardware, with the 2025 Japan Motor context underscoring that this isn’t a distant idea but an active transition.
In that reporting, the language is blunt: Toyota is prepping newly developed engines for the next-gen Corolla, and that shift may spell doom for the GR’s turbo three. The same coverage notes that when Toyota’s GR Corolla first arrived, it did so with that 300-horsepower three-cylinder as its calling card, but the new strategy suggests the company sees a turbo four as the more sustainable path. One detailed breakdown explains that Toyota is prepping newly developed engines for the next-gen Corolla, and that this may undercut the viability of the GR’s turbo three going forward. For anyone who fell in love with the car precisely because it wasn’t powered by a typical four-cylinder, that’s a clear line in the sand between the outgoing golden era and what comes next.
Why Toyota Is Walking Away From the I-3
From the outside, it’s easy to romanticize the three-cylinder and blame Toyota for abandoning the fun, but the reality is more complicated. High-output small-displacement engines are expensive to engineer, tricky to certify, and often hard to justify in a world where emissions rules keep tightening. A 300-horsepower 1.6-liter that lives near its limits is not the easiest way to hit fleet targets or keep warranty costs predictable, especially when the same performance can be delivered by a slightly larger, less stressed four-cylinder that shares more parts with other models.
That’s the backdrop for the shift toward a new 2.0-liter four-cylinder that’s being discussed for the next GR Corolla. One detailed look at the future car explains that the next version of the hot hatch could use a new 2.0-liter four-cylinder in place of the G16E-GTS, with the analysis noting that this change is what Toyota needs for the car to be viable going forward. The report spells out that the Next version of the hot hatch could ditch inline-three power, and that the GTS-branded G16E-GTS simply doesn’t fit the long-term plan. When I put that alongside the broader industry trend toward modular four-cylinder families, the decision looks less like betrayal and more like a cold calculation that leaves enthusiasts on the losing end.
How the Market Will Treat the Last 3-Cylinder GR Corollas
Whenever an automaker kills off a distinctive engine, the final model years tend to harden into collectibles, and the GR Corolla’s three-cylinder is set up perfectly for that trajectory. It’s rare by design, tied to a short production window, and already has a reputation as one of the most characterful powertrains Toyota has ever sold in a mainstream car. As the new turbo four comes online and the G16E-GTS fades out, I expect used prices for clean, low-mileage examples to climb, especially for early cars that enthusiasts see as the purest expression of the formula.
There are already hints of how this will play out. Commentary around Toyota’s shift away from three-cylinder engines points out that the company is scrapping that layout in favor of the new hardware, and it uses back-to-back drives of different model years to highlight how the character is changing. In one detailed comparison, a reviewer notes that when you look at the side profile, the car looks almost identical from 2024 to 2025, but driving them back-to-back reveals a very different experience, with the three-cylinder car feeling more raw and special. That perspective comes through in a video posted on Aug 17, 2025, where the creator emphasizes that Toyota is scrapping three-cylinder engines for a new setup and that the difference between the made from 24 to 25 cars is obvious behind the wheel. When the market realizes that the older, weirder version is gone for good, the price gap between it and the newer, more conventional cars is likely to widen.
Why the 3-Cylinder’s Character Can’t Be Replaced
On paper, a new turbo four might match or even beat the three-cylinder’s numbers, but numbers are only half the story. The G16E-GTS has a distinct sound, a slightly offbeat vibration, and a sense of urgency that comes from asking three cylinders to do the work of four. It’s the kind of engine that feels alive even at low speeds, and that personality is what made the GR Corolla feel like a throwback to the days when powertrains had quirks instead of being engineered into anonymity. Once Toyota swaps in a smoother, more conventional four-cylinder, the car may become faster or more refined, but it will inevitably lose some of that mechanical theater.
That’s why I see the current GR Corolla as the last of a specific type of Toyota: a mass-market car built around a deliberately odd engine choice. The reporting that lays out Toyota’s move toward a new turbo four makes it clear that the company is prioritizing efficiency, scalability, and long-term viability over that kind of eccentricity. The coverage that first framed this shift, including the analysis that the No More I-3 For GR Corolla? Toyota’s New Turbo Four Gets Ready to Roar moment is coming, underlines that this is a strategic pivot, not a temporary experiment. For enthusiasts, that means the three-cylinder GR Corolla isn’t just another used performance car; it’s the last chapter of a brief, brilliant period when Toyota let its engineers build something gloriously strange.
What Buyers Should Do Before Prices Spike
If you’re even half-serious about owning a three-cylinder GR Corolla, the most practical advice I can give is simple: move sooner rather than later. As news of the engine’s replacement filters through the community, the cars that exist now will be reclassified in people’s minds from “current model” to “last of the line,” and that mental shift is usually what triggers the first serious price bumps. Dealers who still have cars on the lot will lean on the scarcity narrative, and private sellers will start pointing to the incoming turbo four as proof that their car is the “real” GR.
That doesn’t mean you should panic-buy, but it does mean you should be strategic. Focus on well-documented cars with low mileage, and pay attention to how they were used—track-heavy examples will age differently from lightly driven street cars. I’d also keep an eye on how Toyota structures the transition once the new engine arrives; if the company limits production of the last three-cylinder cars or introduces a final special edition, those specific builds will likely command the biggest premiums. The underlying trend is already visible in the way analysts talk about the next-gen Corolla and its new powertrain, with multiple reports tying the future of the car to the new turbo four and framing the current G16E-GTS as something that simply isn’t viable long term. Once that narrative fully takes hold, the market will treat the three-cylinder GR Corolla less like a new car and more like a modern classic, and the cost of entry will rise accordingly.
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