The Honda Passport TrailSport is strutting its stuff.

Just a year after its introduction, the off-road-focused halo model of the midsize Passport SUV is already getting a glow-up to meet high demand. Leaning into consumers’ insatiable appetite for rugged SUVs, a lack of Detroit competitors, and a deregulated U.S. market, the 2027, all-terrain-tire-clad Passport TrailSport gains an even more macho wardrobe with 9.7-inch ground clearance, bigger fender flares and extensive suspension re-engineering.

The aggressive styling reflects the fourth-generation Passport’s record sales in the midsize SUV segment — 80% of them TrailSport models. The move comes as Honda has been unburdened by U.S. electric vehicle mandates and the scrapping of its 0 Series EV line. Made in Alabama, the profit-rich Passport has moved up the sales rankings as Detroit automakers Ford and Chevrolet either left the segment (Ford Edge) or focused on different trims (the midsize Chevy Blazer offers sporty SS and electric models, rather than an off-road focused model).

Japanese automakers like Honda, Toyota and Subaru have filled the void with a range of rugged utes. Honda has not yet released pricing for the 2027 Passport TrailSport. The 2026 model listed at $50,245 (the base, all-wheel-drive Passport starts at $46,545).

"Our team of passionate engineers is taking our ultimate Honda adventure SUV and making it even more capable for 2027," said Honda National Auto Sales Assistant Vice President Luis Guerra. "By enhancing both the driving experience and off-road capability, Honda Passport offers our customers an SUV for their daily life and next great adventure."

The two-row, midsize off-road segment has long been dominated by the Jeep Grand Cherokee (and its lifted Trailhawk halo model featuring all-terrain tires) with annual sales north of 200,000 units.

The Passport TrailSport takes direct aim at the Toyota 4Runner TRD Off-Road and Land Cruiser, rugged Japanese SUVs that have followed the Grand Cherokee in offering customers an adventurous-looking SUV even if it's only used as a daily driver. The strategy has worked with the 4Runner/Land Cruiser pushing nearly 150,000-unit sales in 2025. The Passport sold a record 55,231 units in 2025 and sales are up 20% this year through August.

“More is better,” said iSeeCars.com auto analyst Karl Brauer. “Honda is hearing from its customers that a little off-road aggressiveness was good ― and that they didn’t go hard enough. (This is) one of most encouraging things a car company can do: listen to your customers, react to the market, do it as quickly as possible. Passport has achieved new visibility in the overlanding world that has been exploding for the last four years.”

Unlike the Toyota twins built on the ladder-frame chassis of the best-selling midsize pickup in the U.S. market, the Toyota Tacoma, Passport is more like the Grand Cherokee with its unibody-based chassis. The Passport shares its architecture with the brand’s three-row Pilot (which also offers a lifted, all-terrain-tire TrailSport model) and the midsize Ridgeline pickup.

All-wheel-drive brand Subaru has also made an aggressive play in the midsize off-road space with its all-new unibody 2026 Outback, which has been redesigned as an SUV, shedding its station wagon appearance. Like its Japanese peers, the Outback features a lifted, all-terrain-tires Wilderness model.

Honda says the combination of a smooth unibody chassis and off-road engineering makes for “authentic off-road capability and exceptional on-road performance.”

The TrailSport halo strategy in the SUV space is reminiscent of what Honda had done in the compact sedan segment where the sporty Civic Si and Type R models have been embraced by the tuner crowd and helped elevate Civic to be the best-selling retail compact in America.

Toyota recently leaned into a similar strategy with its Civic competitor, the Corolla. The compact Toyota now features a popular GR Corolla version. Like TRD in the SUV space, Toyota now stamps on-road performance models with the GR badge, including the GR86 sportscar and a GR supercar.

“Just as Toyota has gone into what was traditionally Honda's realm of performance-car fun, Honda is starting to tread on Toyota’s world of off-road performance,” said Brauer. “Land Cruisers and 4Runners are genuinely capable off-road, and now Honda has that with Passport TrailSport.”

The aggressive marketing push by Honda and Toyota in the midsize SUV space comes as segment veterans Chevrolet and Ford have turned their priorities elsewhere.

Ford once offered the midsize Edge (which included a sporty ST halo model) ,which consistently sold over 100,000 copies a year before the automaker discontinued it in 2024 ― reportedly as the brand considered a midsize, electric SUV.

Ford brackets the midsize off-road SUV segment with the ladder-frame Bronco and unibody Bronco Sport Badlands model in the compact segment and midsize, three-row, unibody Explorer Tremor.

Chevrolet also offers a three-row, all-terrain-tired Z71 model of its three-row Traverse SUV. The two-row, midsize Chevy Blazer, however, leans into the brand’s sporty heritage with an SS model and does not offer a Z71 trim with all-terrain tires.

“General Motors sems to have completely left the table,” said Brauer. “Whether it's a genuinely capable off-road vehicle or an off-road appearance package, customers want SUVs marketed as capable vehicles. There's an increasing the number of people that may or may not be doing serious off-roading — but, boy, do they love the concept behind Passport TrailSport, and what it theoretically can do.”

To bolster its off-road cred, the Passport TrailSport underwent a comprehensive engineering update that goes beyond cosmetic upgrades and includes new amber hood scoop lights, more pronounced fender flares, and wardrobe options like Smoke Blue Pearl paint and Blackout Package.

In addition to the 1.4-inch ground clearance upgrade (to 9.7 inches), suspension upgrades also adds improvements in breakover, approach, and departure angles. Nearly 70% of the major suspension components were redesigned, including springs, shocks, stabilizer bars and knuckles. Honda touts the lift as higher than the 4Runner TRD Off-Road or Outback Wilderness.

Electronic goodies are also an important part of off-road packages today. In addition to the mechanical upgrades, the 2027 Passport TrailSport trim now comes standard with a multi-view TrailWatch camera system, a heated steering wheel, and a new Honda Trail Experience (HTX) that integrates real-time vehicle data with video when recording off-road adventures.

Honda’s pivot to the Passport TrailSport upgrade is a dramatic departure from the company’s “Second Founding” focus of recent years on becoming an all-electric brand. That EV evolution, designed to satisfy aggressive EV sales mandates in California (35% EV sales by the 2026 model year) as well as at the federal level, included a new, electric 0 Series model line beginning with the Honda 0 Series SUV and Acura RSX models this year. Those plans were scrapped as customer demand for EVs didn’t materialize and U.S. government mandates and sales subsidies disappeared.

“When automakers are allowed to sell the vehicles they know their buyers want, guess what? They sell more vehicles and all the financial numbers look better,” Brauer said of Honda, which took a loss last year for the first time in its history. “When they're not allowed to sell what customers want, they have to write down tens of billions in losses.”

Made in Alabama, the Passport is one of five Hondas on the Top Ten list of Cars.com's 2026 American-Made Index. The 2027 Passport TrailSport will arrive in dealerships later this month.

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