Every 2024 Toyota Tacoma Off-Road Feature Explained

Toyota trucks have long been at home off pavement, competing with distinction in various Baja races in heavily modified form. For its fourth-generation Tacoma, Toyota is dialing up the truck's four-wheeling credibility as it rolls off the factory floor, adding lots of new gear and electronics that promise to make it easier than ever to go off-roading or overlanding in an N400 Toyota Tacoma. This starts with offering an off-road variant for every purse and purpose—from the leaf-sprung rear-drive TRD PreRunner to the TRD Off-Road to the desert-running TRD Pro and the rock-crawling, overlanding Trailhunter. Here's an extensive look through the new Tacoma's off-road toolkit:

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Max Articulation

Toyota admits some of the third-generation Tacoma's overall chassis articulation was achieved by allowing the open-channel back half of the frame itself to twist. The N400 gets a much more rigid fully boxed frame, reinforced by tailor-welded blanks that increase stiffness where needed. Simply switching from leaf springs to a five-link coil sprung rear axle achieves more (and better quality) chassis articulation, though only mid- and upper trim levels get that upgrade.

A front stabilizer-bar disconnect (optional on TRD Off Road, standard on TRD Pro and Trailhunter) enables even more articulation. Our sister brandFourWheeler's Ramp-Travel Index quantifies articulation by measuring how far a single front wheel can travel up a 20-degree ramp before a rear tire leaves the ground, dividing that distance by the wheelbase, and multiplying by 1,000. The new Tacoma scores 510, while a stock 2017 N300 Tacoma Off-Road managed just 413

And the disconnect mechanism is new, trading a sliding splined collar for a system of recessed beveled "teeth." A rotating collar causes these teeth to engage similar "teeth" without ever binding. This setup also locks more securely, with no slop.

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Bilstein Monotube Shocks

The big, fancy desert-runner Fox Shocks on the TRD Pro and the equally exotic (but better optimized for rock-crawling) Old Man Emu units on the new Trailhunter model get all the attention, but pricing will reserve those models for only the most dedicated (and well-heeled) wheelers. (Note that the Fox units now offer three-position adjustment on the shock body, and are augmented by a set of Fox hydraulic jounce bumpers residing inside the tops of the coil springs). Many more customers will experience the Bilsteins that come standard on the TRD Off Road model.

Like the others, this Bilstein, too, is a monotube design with an external reservoir to provide better travel and improved heat dissipation in extreme use. These units also incorporate End Stop Control Valve technology that forces the damping fluid through additional valving at the extreme ends of the travel, ramping up damping force at the ends of the piston stroke. Adding damping at the extremes permits greater compliance over smaller bumps. Toyota claims these are very long-lived shocks, as their development engineers sometimes witnessed their surviving multiple extreme durability cycles. Note that base and Limited models employ Hitachi twin-tube shocks, while the PreRunner gets Toyota-branded Tokicos.

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Driver Aids Control Center

Down to the left of the gearshift is the selector for all the Tacoma's driver aids and system controls. Electronic control of the transfer case is at the top of this switch. Down and to the left is the Drive Mode switch. All models now add a tow/haul mode to last year's normal and ECT PWR modes, but mid-grade models will get a new "3-Mode system" with Sport/Sport S, Eco, and Tow/Haul added to "normal," while top models get a  "5-Mode" setup that adds Sport S+, Comfort, and programmable Custom modes to the above. At the 6-o'clock position is the button for Downhill Assist Control (aka hill-descent control). When in 4L, this button engages crawl control (aka off-road cruise control).

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Multi-Terrain Select

Multi-Terrain Select switch at the 9-o'clock position offers the choice of dirt, sand, mud, snow, rock, and auto modes whenever 4H or 4L modes are engaged. Importantly, these modes now employ a coordinated combination of powertrain and braking/stability control interventions to achieve the desired traction capabilities (they previously only commanded braking and stability).

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Multi-Terrain Monitor

A row of buttons directly aft of the shifter control the clutch-start-cancel switch (manual transmission models only), which allows the vehicle to be started with the clutch engaged, to prevent rolling back on a hill. The stability-bar disconnect switch is here, as is one that brings up the multi-terrain monitor. This "invisible hood" feature works while driving forward, by delaying images from the front camera and presenting them along with a phantom outline of the tires and hood, so the driver can see obstacles relative to the tires.

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Trail/Campsite Lighting

You shouldn't drive where you can't see, and Tacoma helps in this regard by offering standard LED lighting that reduces power consumption by 58 percent while extending the former halogen bulbs' reach by 22 percent in distance and 73 percent in width. White daytime running lights double as sequential amber turn signals and wide-angle fog lamps (standard on SR5 and above) and broaden the near-field beam width by 25 percent. TRD Pro and Trailhunter boost the lumens with a light bar located just beneath the TOYOTA grille logo that nearly doubles the high-beam light output. In place of the standard fog lamps these models get Rigid units that further boost reach by 45 percent and width by 30 percent. And they're switchable between white and yellow light (which is supposedly better for fog or dust).

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Scene Lighting

Setting up camp after dark? The pickup box is well illuminated from above the cab and two under-rail lights just above the wheel wells, while the hitch area behind is covered by a lamp near the tailgate release. LED lamps mounted outside each corner of the box can light a broad area and top models come pre-wired with aux switches to control a pair of bright white scene lights in the rear bumper (these offer red rings around the outside to boost visibility to following vehicles on a dusty trail). And to power your campsite, the Tacoma box offers a trifecta of power: 12-volt, USB (A and C), and a 120-volt plug that's good for 400 watts (2,400 watts on Hybrid Max variants).

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HiLift-Jacking and Recovery

If you're really trying off-road, you're occasionally going to get stuck. So top models come equipped with ARB-branded recovery points bolted to the rear frame, but all rear-coil-spring models (every trim level above the base SR and TRD PreRunner) get frames prepped with bolt-sleeve collars to support bolting these on (using a kinetic energy "snatch strap" can exert twice the vehicle's loaded mass on these recovery hooks). Frames so-prepped also include built-in jacking points for a Hi-Lift jack. These points are located such that the trailer-hitch support beam passes through in just the right spot to keep the Hi-Lift jack from going in too far, which could result in body or bumper damage.

We can't wait to put all this gear to the test, and to pit a Toyota Tacoma TRD Pro against a Chevrolet Colorado ZR2 and Ford Ranger Raptor.

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