2021 Toyota Hilux Rogue v 2021 Nissan Navara Pro-4X

By Alex Forrest

In Western Australia, we like our utes more than the rest of the country. In the first half of 2021, utes comprised 32 per cent of the vehicles sold in WA. Over the same period Australia-wide, utes made up only 20 per cent of all sales.

The Toyota Hilux was the most popular 4x4 ute among WA buyers in the first half of 2021, while the Nissan Navara 4x4 was in sixth spot.

However, among private buyers especially, it’s the higher-priced utes with extras like stylised fender flares, tray covers, special wheels, and dedicated paint colours and decals that are proving very popular. They’re still utes, but they’re far from utilitarian.

Here, we compare two well-optioned workhorses – the Toyota Hilux Rogue and the Nissan Navara Pro-4X.

Both are designed to appeal to buyers who would otherwise make these kinds of additions to their utes using aftermarket suppliers. With vehicles like these, manufacturers are taking on the aftermarket at their own game. Let’s see how well they do.

Value for money
The Hilux Rogue is priced at $76,420 drive away, making it $14,000 more expensive than the Navara Pro-4X ($62,290). As is the case with all of these highly specified utes, the critical factor is whether buyers actually want or need all of those extras, and whether it would be better value to choose a lower specification ute like a Navara ST-X and then add only the options they want. This is a much better Rogue than the old one and very well equipped, but it’s also $10,000 more than a Hilux SR5. The Navara Pro-4X is much cheaper than the Hilux Rogue, but it misses out on gear like heated and electrically adjustable seats, and radar cruise control, which you might expect in a near top-of-the-range model.

On the road
Both the Navara Pro-4X and the Hilux Rogue have the same towing capacity (3500kg) for a braked trailer, however the Rogue’s maximum rated payload capacity is 819kg, whereas the Pro-4X has a maximum payload of 1004kg.

Following a 2020 update that saw the Rogue’s 2.8-litre turbo diesel engine receive a major power and torque upgrade to 150kW and 500Nm, the driving experience is now less frenetic and laboured. The Navara’s twin-turbo 2.3-litre diesel makes slightly less at 140kW and 450Nm. But many will find the Navara surprisingly refined, and we found its grunt from low down in the rev range particularly useful when hauling a load of mountain bikes and riders up a rough gravel road in Kalamunda. Ride quality when unladen is still jiggly in both utes, such is their nature, but better than in previous models.

Safety and Practicality
Both the Navara Pro4X and the Hilux Rogue have 5-star ANCAP vehicle safety ratings, however the Navara was rated using 2015 protocols and the Hilux was rated using 2019 protocols. As ANCAP testing protocols have become stricter since then, their ratings may be slightly different today, if tested.

The Rogue’s electric roller shutter that covers the tray is handy as it provides a large area to securely store gear. Yet when rolled back, it allows for tall items to be carried, which a traditional hard ute tray cover doesn’t. On the other hand, the open tray of the Navara offers more usable length because it doesn’t have the box for the roller shutter.

Verdict
There’s no doubt the Hilux has a better finished interior with a few more features. But if you’re going to be carrying some big loads on the back – like dirt bikes or lawn mowers, the Navara would do a better job with its unobstructed tray length and bigger payload. So, if money was no object and we weren’t needing the tray for heavy, bulky gear, we’d take the Hilux. If we needed the full ute functionality, it’d be the Navara.