2018 Toyota Tundra: What's Changed

• Most significant changes: The Tundra gets an all-new trim level, the TRD Sport, and the TRD Pro trim goes on hiatus; the entire lineup gets standard Toyota Safety Sense P; and a regular cab is no longer available.
• Price change: Not available
• On sale: Early August
• Which should you buy, 2017 or 2018? 2018 — the standard advanced safety technology should come with only incremental price increases across the lineup.

When it goes on sale in August, the 2018 Toyota Tundra will be one of the oldest vehicles in the highly competitive half-ton segment, with relatively few changes to the lineup since its debut in 2014. It also will lose the low-volume regular-cab option, leaving just double-cab and CrewMax choices. Also, not available for 2018: the TRD Pro; it will go on hiatus much like the 2015 Tacoma TRD Pro went on hiatus before the all-new Tacoma came out. The new Tacoma TRD Pro returned for 2017. Based on that, we can expect the Tundra TRD Pro to return for the 2020 model year.

The 2018 Tundra will be mostly unchanged except for the all-new TRD Sport trim level available in October; it slots between the SR5 and Limited trims. Each of the other trim levels — the SR, SR5, Limited, Platinum and 1794 Edition — get a new grille design and updated headlight look, while the interior gets a new gauge cluster design that includes a larger 4.2-inch information display screen between the tachometer and speedometer.

All trim levels, from the base SR to the fully loaded Platinum or 1794 Edition CrewMax pickups, will come standard with the Toyota Safety Sense P that includes a precollision system with pedestrian detection, lane departure alert, automatic high-beam detection and adaptive cruise control. This comes as part of Toyota's mandate for making all its vehicles safer by 2018.

Tundra will continue to offer its two stalwart gas V-8 engines (the 4.6-liter and 5.7-liter) and three bed lengths; however, since the Tundra loses the regular-cab option, the number of base-level SR configurations has dropped by four. Double-cab 5.7-liter V-8 SR models for 2017 were just $890 more.

All Tundras will continue to offer the six-speed transmission and should continue to have a strong following due to their quality, reliability and resale value. Unfortunately, all of the Tundra's competitors have redone or are planning a major redesign soon. We're expecting a new Tundra for the 2019 model year.

Towing and payload capacities will remain the same for the 2018 models, meaning the Tundra will offer gross vehicle weight and gross combined weight ratings competitive with similarly equipped half-ton pickups.

Our favorite Tundra features are the optional 38-gallon fuel tank and the TRD performance parts.

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