Volkswagen Still Has Its Eyes On A Pickup Truck

Pickup trucks are big business in America, and Volkswagen is still looking for a way in, according to Volkswagen Group of America’s CEO Kjell Gruner. At a media panel during the 2026 New York International Auto Show (NYIAS), Gruner said that the brand can't "rule out" the idea of a pickup, but maintains that a few things need to line up before the brand can produce a pickup for the American market.

VW already makes pickups for other American markets: It has sold its Amarok pickup since 2010 in markets like Europe and Argentina. Here in the US, the pickup truck market is so sizable, Volkswagen "can't just say, I'm going to ignore it, and we don't." The brand is, in particular, looking at smaller trucks and how the segments are developing here in the States. We have a robust midsize truck segment, filled to the brim with options from Ford, Toyota, Chevrolet, and plenty of others. However, the compact truck segment is a different story; Ford effectively holds a monopoly on the compact segment with the Maverick, accounting for an overwhelming majority of compact sales in years past.

"...I wouldn't want to rule it out at all… a pickup truck is not ruled out," said Gruner. It's clear why the brand is eyeing the smaller of the three main pickup segments in the US. Volkswagen has its own modular vehicle platform, which the brand uses to build everything from small hatchbacks to full-size SUVs, hybrids, and EVs. However, these vehicles all have a singular trait in common, and one that isn't common among full-size pickups in the US: unibody construction. Rather than bolting a body and engine to a frame, as body-on-frame trucks do, unibody vehicles like the Golf are assembled with a single cab and chassis. This type of construction is much more common in the smaller truck segments, making it easier for VW to produce a truck within them, if and when it should choose to do so.