This Is Your First Official Look At The New Nissan '400Z'

Following test-mule spy shots of the 370Z successor late last year, Nissan has released grainy images of the all-new '400Z'

Alex Kersten

28 May 2020

This Is Your First Official Look At The New Nissan '400Z'

The replacement for the Nissan 370Z has been on the cards for a couple of years and now, finally, there is light at the end of the empty Z-shaped tunnel thanks to this new teaser video from the manufacturer called ‘Nissan Next: From A to Z’. See what they did there?

This first look reveals the ‘400Z’s‘ (a name that’s likely but not confirmed) sleek coupe body, whose lines look as though a Toyota Supra front-end and Jaguar F-Type rear-end met in a bar and made sweet, sweet love; it’s a good look, and one befitting a sports car that may use the 400bhp VR30DDTT 3.0-litre twin-turbo V6 used in the Infiniti Q50 and Q60 as well as the current Nissan Skyline.

Either way, Nissan’s clearly not keen on diluting the Z lineage. Speaking to Auto Express in 2018, Nissan’s senior vice president of design Alfonso Albaisa confirmed that Nissan would “never leave this [the Z-car] alone”, meaning that whatever the fire power may be, it’ll certainly be brawny enough to keep pace with its big-engined rivals.

In other Nissan news, the company will aim to release 12 new models (including the halo ‘400Z’) by 2021, the focus of which will be aimed at North America, Japan and China.

SUVs and EV crossovers will make much of the new lineup, which is a very good move. While they’re popular with mass market buyers, they also serve the more pressing objective of making enough money to help make enthusiast cars like the new Z possible, even as the company seeks to dramatically cut costs over the next few years.

What are your thoughts on the new look Z?

Comments

Looks a lot like Jaguar (back half) and Aston Martin (front grille) combined.

Oops I didn’t read the article when commenting that. It’s nice to see that I’m not the only one imagining that. XD

It looks interesting to say the least and its good to see the Z-Line back!

This looks good so far, the front end seems very 240Z-like. Let’s just hope it doesn’t get a CVT, cause this could be great.

I dunno, but the last 2 Zs before this one uses the 240Z (S30) as the styling cue. The 370Z is the most obvious one, the silhouette of the S30 240Z can be clearly spotted on the 370Z.

The thing I’m most curious about is: would it have a 4 liter engine or is it going to be one of those lame naming strategy.

Probably 400 hp I’m assuming

It better have a god damn 4.0 V6 cuz it won’t line up what they have been doing for like the past 50 years

It’s simply because they’re naming the car “Fairlady” for the domestic market in Japan. When they did the legendary S30Z (known as the Datsun 240Z outside of Japan) They started naming it “Fairlady Z”. Considering how masculine the 240Z looks are, the guys in Nissan thought that naming the car “Fairlady” won’t suit the car’s muscular image while the car was boasting large displacement and powerful engine as well as strikingly masculine appearance , especially for the US market as it once intended - thus they named the Z-cars based on it’s engine displacement for the international market (example: 240Z for having 2.4l L6 engine, 280Z/280ZX because it has 2.8l engine, 300ZX for its 3l engine, 350Z for its 3.5l engine displacement, 370Z because of the 3.7 litre engine displacement). Just for this ocassion they named the car after how much horses the engine has under the hood (in this case, 400 HP - thus it’s a 400Z) instead of the engine displacement as they once used as a cue to name the car. I think the naming system used on the Fairlady Z car was a rather confusing one. They should’ve sticked to name the car ‘Fairlady’ because most Fairlady Zs (the S30Z for example) were looking beautiful and graceful despite the car’s muscular aura. Otherwise they should gave the car and its lineup a differrent name from the green flag - although it sounds rather unplausible since the Nissan Fairlady Z’s history can be traced back to the Nissan Fairlady 1600 roadster of the mid-60s, which matches the car’s beautiful and rather ‘ladylike’ appearance since it being smaller compared to the later Fairlady Zs; if it’s possible to give a suggestion for the name of the first “Fairlady” I think it should be named either “Admiral” or “Kaze” (wind - because of the roadster body style allows the driver to feel the blowing wind while driving at speed. The subsequent Z cars could be named “Kaze Z” because it’s supposed to be a performance sports car that can go ‘like a breeze’ given the car’s concept being a high displacement FR grand touring coupe sports car). That’s what I think, let me know if I’m wrong.