The Lexus Pickup at SEMA Is a Tacoma Underneath

A Lexus-badged pickup with a GX 550 face, portal axles and 38-inch tires is sitting on the floor of the 2026 SEMA Show, and it started life as a Toyota Tacoma.

The truck is called the TX1, and it is the work of a California shop rather than Lexus, which has never sold a pickup in the United States. It is on display at the Toyo Tires Treadpass exhibit at the Las Vegas Convention Center, where the show runs through Friday, November 6.

The build was reported by Motor1, which credits it to Meso Customs and says the project began as a computer rendering by a digital artist before the shop decided to make it real. The doors and greenhouse are still Tacoma, but the front end borrows the GX 550’s grille, headlights and hood shape, with a redesigned bumper and Lexus mirrors, and the rear carries a full-width LED light bar in the style of the GX. The wide fenders wear body-colored extensions, and many of the pieces that tie it together were designed in CAD and 3D-printed.

The bed is custom too, and it works part of the GX’s rear hatch design into the sides. The tailgate uses Rivian latches and folds into a rear-facing bench with heated seats and Bluetooth speakers. Underneath, the shop fitted King Off-Road Racing shocks, a suspension lift, 74Weld portal axles, beadlock wheels, upgraded brakes and 38-inch Toyo Open Country R/T Trail tires, with Baja Designs lights on the roof, bumper and mirrors and a rally-style bar above the windshield.

The engine is the Tacoma’s stock turbocharged 2.4-liter four-cylinder, which gets an SXTH Element intake and a front-mounted intercooler, although Motor1 says the shop has not released output figures. Meso Customs also stresses that the TX1 is a one-off and not a conversion package customers can order, so nobody should expect to see one on a Lexus lot.

It is the second Toyota-based truck at this year’s show to arrive on portal axles, after the Mountain Yotas Tacoma that accompanied the shop’s armored GX 550, and it joins a Toyota display that lifted everything from a Sienna to a Crown Signia for the Woodland and Snowhunter concepts.

The Toyota Report Take

A Lexus pickup is the kind of idea that comes up every few years and goes nowhere, because Lexus buyers in this country have never asked for one and the GX already covers the premium off-road job. What the TX1 shows is how little separates the two brands’ hardware: a Tacoma’s cab, a GX’s face and some careful 3D printing get you most of the way to something that looks like it came out of Plano.

That is also why it will stay a one-off. Toyota sells every Tacoma it can build and every GX 550 it can import, and the margins on both are better than anything a niche luxury truck would earn. Enjoy it on the show floor, because that is the only place it is going to live.