Despite a huge update, the 2026 Nissan Leaf comes in at $31,485 to start.
Over 15 years and two generations, the Nissan Leaf offered up a unashamedly practical EV, if not a terribly exciting one. Now, though, the third-generation 2026 Nissan Leaf aims to liven things up a bit, with major styling updates, a fresh interior and more competitive range. Even with all the changes, though, the automaker is sticking to its guns on pricing the Leaf competitively to the growing list of competition. When it officially goes on sale this fall, the base S+ model will start at $31,485 including destination.
Technically (and not even counting for inflation), that price point makes the 2026 model cheaper than the Leaf’s MSRP when it debuted back in 2011. That said, the starting price is still a jump from the 2025’s $29,280 mark, but you are getting quite a bit more for the money.
Though we’ll see the base S and non-Plus models later on, Nissan is mainly focusing on the S+, SV+ and Platinum+ with Tuesday’s announcement. These are the models that pack a substantially larger 75-kilowatt-hour battery pack, and sport a range of up to 303 miles. Like many other EVs coming in the 2026 model year, the new Leaf also brings NACS support for DC fast-charging, opening Nissan’s entry-level EV up to the Tesla Supercharger network.
The mid-range SV+ is the butter zone for value, and as such tends to be the Leaf’s most popular trim. And there’s good news on that front, because that model actually undercuts the 2025 version’s MSRP by $1,960, for a starting price of $35,725. Stepping up to the SV+ trim upgrades the dual displays from 12.3 inches to 14.3 inches, and gives you a set of 18-inch alloy wheels rather than the steelies you still get on the base S and S+.
At the top of the Leaf stack, the Platinum+ model comes in at $40,485, which is a pretty major jump over the prior trims. For that, you do get larger 19-inch wheels, a Bose sound system and a dimming panoramic roof along with fancier, holographic taillights. Whether it’s worth that kind of money is up to you, though it’ll be interesting to see whether the Leaf makes headlines as a lease star, moreso than as a prospect for outright buyers.
The 2026 Nissan Leaf is still, for all its changes, a front-wheel drive crossover. With the base models, you get a single motor putting out 174 horsepower and 254 lb-ft of torque, so it’s still no sports car. Getting into the 75-kWh battery models (the “Plus” trims) gets you a bit more grunt, with 214 horsepower and 261 lb-ft of torque. That should still be enough for the sort of people who get these as their daily runabout, though we’ll have to see whether the updates and the pricing structure endear the new 2026 Nissan Leaf to a wider set of buyers and lessees.
