It took a little longer than many expected, but the day finally came: the Nissan Altima is gone. The news was confirmed by Ponz Pandikuthira, the company’s senior VP and chief product and planning officer for the Americas, who said the Rogue Plug-in Hybrid, a badge-engineered Mitsubishi Outlander that was always intended to be a stop-gap product, is also departing after just one model year.
We first heard whispers of the Altima’s demise in 2024, when reports gave the midsize sedan a two-year forecast. Well, two years later, and here we are. The Altima was always known as a chaotic force on American roads, but it’s easy to hide the fact that it used to be ubiquitous, especially in the ’90s and early aughts, when Nissan was undergoing a design renaissance.
But the Altima couldn’t keep up with the rest of the family sedan pack. It’s been eight years since its last redesign. For 2025, it lost its variable-compression turbocharged powertrain, and now, we’re losing it altogether. Pandikuthira told Ward Auto The company wants to focus on the new Sentra, which it describes as more “adult”.
From 2026 to today, Altima sales have been Below 32%, from 62,107 units to 42,288, while the Sentra saw a smaller decline of about 12%, from 85,523 to 75,549.
This news shouldn’t be taken to mean that Nissan has echoed Detroit’s complete disinterest in sedans, so much as it suggests that the company was aiming to replace the Altima and Maxima (which leaves us in 2023) with electric cars. Not surprisingly, market stagnation has put those plans on hold for the time being.
“We had planned two EV sedans for the space occupied by the Altima and Maxima, but EV volumes have not taken off yet,” Pandikuthira said. ward. “It may be closer to 2029 or 2030 before we see a resurgence in that segment.”
As far as the Rogue PHEV is concerned, Nissan was very clear from the beginning that that vehicle was always intended to have a short life, buying it some time to get its first domestic hybrid, the Rogue e-Power, into showrooms. “If people shopping online see that the Rogue doesn’t offer a hybrid, they won’t go to the dealer,” Pandikuthira said. Mitsubishi came to the rescue, and the plug-in SUV has done its duty, now being phased out.
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