The Toyota Soarer is a personal luxury GT coupé produced from 1981 to 2005 by Toyota and sold in Japan. It was available at both Japanese Toyota dealerships called Toyota Store and Toyopet Store, and it debuted with the Z10 series, replacing the Toyopet Store exclusive Mark II coupé, and the Toyota Store exclusive Crown coupé.
In 1986, the Z20 series Soarer was launched, based on the then new A70 series Supra platform. In 1991, the Z30 series Soarer premiered in Japan, while its Lexus equivalent, the SC 300/400 debuted in the US market.
While externally identical to the SC, the Z30 series Soarer lineup offered different powertrain specifications and multiple unique vehicle configurations. In 2001, Toyota introduced a convertible-only successor in Japan as the Z40 series Soarer and elsewhere as the SC 430. In contrast to previous series, the Z40 series Soarer and SC were based on a single model and were largely equivalent. In 2005, following the introduction of Lexus in Japan, the Soarer name and emblem were discontinued, and the Z40 model became the SC 430 in common with worldwide markets.
In its home market, the Soarer was a competitor to the Nissan Leopard and Mazda Cosmo coupes, and served as Toyota’s “halo car“, introducing new technologies before they were installed on other Toyota products. All versions of the Soarer featured a unique winged lion emblem (often mistakenly called a Griffin) as the logo throughout the vehicle.
