Jeep Is Lost in the Wilderness. Can It Find the Trail Again?

An American icon is trying to turn things around to the point execs are publicly admitting mistakes were made. That icon? It’s Jeep.

Arguably Jeep is the Kleenex of off-road vehicles, but the brand’s traditionally rugged reputation has been mired in a mountain of issues ranging from poor reliability, massive recalls, strategic confusion, and more. Even the Wrangler somehow cost over $100,000 in some variants.

Now, the big reset is here.

From dropping the price on a V8-powered Wrangler by $30,000 to dropping the Wagoneer namplate and realigning the Grand Wagoneer lineup, Jeep’s on a mission from high above in Chrysler World Headquarters and Technology Center (known as CTC) to right the ship and get back on the trail. In January, The Drive exclusively reported that the Wrangler 4xe plug-in hybrid was dead. The electrified Wrangler was at one point the best-selling plug-in hybrid in the U.S. market. Then last week, we broke the news that the Grand Cherokee is primed to get its V8 back, SRT-badged Grand Cherokees with Hellcat engines in them and Trackhawk badges smell like they are in the pipeline, and where all the off-road Trail-Rated Grand Cherokee models went now that they are absent from the lineup.

Senior Editor Caleb Jacobs also slid behind the wheel of the resurrected 2026 Jeep Cherokee, now back after a three-year hiatus with a new twist to go after the Toyota RAV4: a standard hybrid powertrain. Jacobs also drove the 2026 Grand Cherokee, which was refreshed and debuts a new baby Hurricane turbo-four engine option. I myself have spent time in the electric Jeep Wagoneer S only to be saddened that the automaker’s first EV seems to be unfinished. And the electric Recon? It’s still not here yet.

We’ve had some inside access to Jeep executives, talked with engineers, designers, and spent countless hours behind the wheel of these machines to figure out what’s really going on. So, let’s go behind the curtain on Jeep to see if the turnaround can actually work.

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