Yes, this is a Nissan Skyline Nismo. No, you can’t have one (unless you’re in Japan).
Depending on how steeped you are in Nissan lore, you may already know that the ‘Skyline’ name never really went away, at least in Japan. The current generation is getting a bit long in the tooth, though, so the automaker saw fit to liven things up with new Nismo and Nismo Limited versions. And to address the elephant in the room: If the Skyline looks familiar, it’s because we know it in North America as the Infiniti Q50, but this Nismo is strictly for folks in the Land of the Rising Sun.
According to Nissan’s statement launching this car, the brief is to “produce a car that’s even faster, more comfortable and safer than its illustrious predecessors.”
The Nismo gets a host of special changes
Nissan still fits the Skyline Nismo with a 3.0-liter twin-turbocharged V6 engine like the Infiniti Q50 Red Sport 400 and the new Nissan Z. This time around, though, Nissan tuned it to produce 414 horsepower and 406 lb-ft of torque. In North American spec, we get 400 horsepower and 350 lb-ft in standard configuration, while the new Z Nismo bumps that up to 420 horsepower and 384 lb-ft. To complement the extra grunt, the Skyline Nismo also gets tweaked Sport and Sport+ drive modes for snappier shifts from the 7-speed automatic transmission.
Only 1,000 examples of the “standard” Nissan Skyline Nismo will exist.
Each Skyline Nismo gets a similar range of aesthetic and performance upgrades to what we saw with the Z Nismo. Each sedan gets 19-inch Enkei wheels wrapped in high-performance rubber, as well as upgraded brake pads and a specially tuned suspension setup. On the visual side, Japanese customers have Stelath Gray as a color option, Nismo badging, fog lights, a different front grille, a leather-wrapped steering wheel, Recaro seats and ring-ringed tachometer.
Nissan plans to cap the even more exclusive Nismo Limited to just 100 units. Each one of those cars gets a serialized engine plaque with the name of the engine’s builder, as well as matte gunmetal painted wheels. The Limited gets more of a hand-built treatment to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the S41A-1 model Skyline GT.
While we won’t get the Skyline over here, Nissan priced it in the same ballpark as the Q50 Red Sport 400, at least to start. Japanese MSRPs for the Skyline Nismo start at 7,880,400 yen (or about $54,900), while the Limited gets a substantial price hike to 9,749,800 yen ($67,900).
Despite lacking the Skyline name, the Infiniti Q50 Red Sport 400 does offer a decently close analog, and Infiniti’s Q50 sedan and Q60 coupe get quite a bit of love in the aftermarket scene. So there’s a silver lining to this piece of “forbidden fruit”.
