Mitsubishi teases Pajero return with video touting rally history

New year is a time for renewal, and 2026 is starting off with a big declaration from Mitsubishi. On January 1 the company released a video teasing a new SUV. While it doesn’t explicitly state what that SUV is, the surrounding footage steeped in old rally machines points strongly to a revived Pajero.

The video kicks off with a montage of Mitsubishi’s rallying successes — the Pajero Evolution at Dakar, the Lancer 1600GSR at the Safari Rally, turbo Lancers leaping through the air. Then the unmistakable guitar riff of Derek and the Dominos’ “Layla” plays while the narrator says (translated from Japanese) “Our passion for motorsports. It hasn’t disappeared.”

Modern clips play of the only Mitsubishi in recent memory to compete internationally, the Triton pickup that won the Asia Cross Country Rally in 2022 and again in 2025. As the video ends we get another shot of a Pajero speeding across Dakar’s sands, then the scene cuts to the teased SUV driving down a road at the same angle.

The implication is clear. But if that’s not enough to convince you of a Pajero revival, the video was released on January 1, an unusual date for a major announcement because it’s typically an important holiday in Japan and around the world and for most automotive media outlets. However, New Year’s Day was the traditional opening of the Paris-Dakar Rally, an event synonymous with the Pajero.

Not only that, Mitsubishi recently restored the first of many Pajeros to have won that epic race. For a small carmaker like Mitsubishi, typically these projects are undertaken when there’s an important story to tell, and marketing a new Pajero might be the only justification for a cash-strapped company to spend money restoring a museum piece.

However, the question of what the new Pajero might be remains. After all, Pajeros famously had their own dedicated factory that, oddly did not have Mitsubishi in the name. Instead, the plant was called Pajero Manufacturing Co., Ltd., an indicator of the model’s significance, and the surrounding city was nicknamed Pajerotown. It was closed in 2020 and, ironically, sold to a toilet paper firm.

So this new Pajero won’t be built at the historic Pajero factory. It seems quite likely that it’s actually a rebadged Nissan Patrol. Nissan launched the seventh-gen Patrol globally in 2024, and in the US, where it’s known as the Armada and Infiniti QX80, in 2025. Notably, the Patrol has not been sold in Japan since 2007 but the Y63 has been announced for Japan sales in early 2027.

The Patrol’s return a big deal, and whatever regulatory or market conditions that have made that possible is likely what’s ushering the Pajero’s comeback as well. If this is correct, both would be powered by Nissan’s VR35DDTT, a twin-turbo 3.5-liter V6. To true Pajero enthusiasts this might seem like a slap in the face, but perhaps it’s better than no Pajero. Needless to say, all can be forgiven if they race it in the Dakar Rally again.