Five years ago, the Ford Explorer was a difficult car to recommend. When I tested a 2021 model, the map light fell out of the headliner, the infotainment kept crashing, the interior was offensively cheap for what Ford was charging, and the whole vehicle just didn’t feel finished. Outside of its towing prowess, there just wasn’t much reason to buy an Explorer over a Kia Telluride or a Volkswagen Atlas. Fortunately, Ford’s since gone back to the drawing board, and today’s Explorer is markedly different.
For 2025, the blue oval gave its three-row crossover a new face, a new infotainment system, and a whole new dashboard. That’s far further than most facelifts go, but was it enough to catch up to the competition? I grabbed the keys to a 2026 Explorer Tremor for a week to find out.
[Full disclosure: Ford Canada let me borrow this Explorer Tremor for a week so long as I kept the shiny side up, returned it reasonably clean with a full tank of fuel, and reviewed it.]
The Basics
Engine: Standard 2.3-liter turbocharged intercooled twin-cam 16-valve inline-four, optional three-liter twin-turbocharged intercooled quad-cam 24-valve V6.
Transmission: Ten-speed torque converter automatic.
Drive: Full-time all-wheel-drive, Torsen helical limited-slip rear differential.
Output: 300 horsepower at 5,500 RPM and 310 lb.-ft. at 3,500 RPM for the four-cylinder, 385 horsepower at 5,500 RPM and 415 lb.-ft. at 3,500 RPM for the V6.
Fuel Economy: 19 MPG city, 23 MPG highway, 21 MPG combined (12.1 L/100km city, 10.1 L/100km highway, 11.2 L/100km combined) for the four-cylinder; 17 MPG city, 22 MPG highway, 19 MPG combined (13.8 L/100km city, 10.6 L/100km highway, 12.4 L/100km combined) for the V6.
Base Price: $50,760 including freight ($61,895 in Canada).
Price As-Tested: $56,915 including freight ($69,870 in Canada).
Why Does It Exist?
Over the past 35 model years, the Ford Explorer has become America’s midsize family SUV, full-stop. I know, the Jeep Grand Cherokee also exists, but it never sold in the same sheer numbers as the Explorer. Nor was it the subject of a high-profile product safety event, but that’s almost tangential in the modern unibody age. At this point, Ford not offering the Explorer would be like a diner not offering a corned beef hash. The menu just feels wrong without it.
As for the Tremor trim, it’s ported over from Ford’s truck line to create a softcore off-roader, a genre aimed at producing vignettes of gravel roads with Vaseline smeared on the lens. Think knobbly tires, tweaked suspension, recovery hooks, and loads of yellow-gold trim. It’s basically the old Explorer Timberline, just harmonized. Think of it as one fewer badge for Ford to stock.
How Does It Look?
It’s safe to say the old Explorer looked a bit awkward, but Ford didn’t have to start from scratch with this facelift. The Chinese-market model already boasted an updated grille and fascia that could be carried over, so Ford whipped up a new set of DOT-spec lights and hey, presto. The result is a more handsome three-row crossover, and the Tremor gets its own touches like a carved out lower fascia and driving lights in the grille. While the yellow-gold accents won’t be to everyone’s taste, the facelifted Explorer looks markedly more appealing than the previous model.
Mind you, there’s still some distance to close at the Chicago Assembly Plant. The build quality of this test unit wasn’t quite as tight as you’d expect to see in say, a Toyota Grand Highlander or Honda Pilot. Not only was the liftgate misaligned, the trim covers for the liftgate hinges were lifting slightly. Still, the misalignment didn’t produce any noticeable extra cabin noise, but with a price tag north of $50,000, you should be allowed to get picky.
What About The Interior?
As it turns out, designing and assembling a whole new dashboard can do wonders for a car’s interior. Who knew? Jokes aside, Ford has been clever here, blending swathes of stitched materials, a splash of fabric, and clever touches like two tiers of storage trays in order to take the fight to the Japanese and Korean competition. It’s not as premium as the cabin in a Hyundai Palisade or Mazda CX-90, but it feels just as well-made as the inside of a Toyota Grand Highlander, and that’s no hardship at all.
So what about comfort and practicality? You know, the real reasons people buy three-row crossovers. That was never a sore spot of the old Explorer, and it continues to be great here. Genuine adult-sized room in all three rows, properly comfy seats in the first two rows, and the easy one-touch power-folding third row on this model makes loading bulky items easy. While 16.3 cu.-ft. of cargo space behind the third row is on the small size for the segment, cargo space with the third-row folded and with both rear rows folded is on-par with the Hyundai Palisade and competitive with the Honda Pilot. A Toyota Grand Highlander is roomier overall, but you probably won’t be hurting for space if you go with the Ford.
How Does It Drive?
While you can spec the Explorer Tremor with a twin-turbocharged V6, more than $11,000 for an extra 85 horsepower and 105 lb.-ft. stings. Thankfully, the standard 300-horsepower 2.3-liter turbocharged inline-four in my test car is more than sufficient. Slinging a two-ton family crossover from zero to 60 mph in about six seconds is impressive stuff, reaching genuine 2000s performance car territory. Partial credit for that goes to the 10-speed automatic transmission, which received substantially better programming than in earlier Explorers. Sure, there’s the occasional firm shift, but the transmission calibration no longer constantly sniffs around for gears like a truffle pig. Actually, given the longitudinal architecture and the Tremor’s Torsen limited-slip rear differential, you can sort of imagine the Explorer as the Mustang Ecoboost’s big-boned cousin.
Maybe that helps explain why the damping of this crossover is so good. The same firm compression and rebound damping aimed at preventing the nose from bashing against rocks on easy trails turns potholes into dull thuds without porpoising over undulating freeway bridges. Head toss is minimal, and for something the size of a tower block, it’s surprisingly confident in the bends. Don’t expect much other than weight from the steering, but the competence of the chassis and the Explorer’s willingness to rotate on throttle make a difference when the going gets icy.
Does It Have The Electronic Crap I Want?
From the rather configurable digital instrument cluster to the landscape 13.2-inch infotainment touchscreen to the litany of toys on tap, the Explorer Tremor almost certainly has the gadgets you want. Heated and ventilated seats, heated mirrors, a touchless power liftgate, multi-zone automatic climate control, wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, everything you’d expect save for a wireless smartphone charger. Okay, you do have to contend with some weird wide-angle distortion to the backup camera, and having virtual infotainment system tiles for many functions including the heated seats and steering wheel is a downgrade over physical buttons, but the stability of this system is far better than Sync 3 was in the last Explorer I tested. As a bonus, the 10-speaker B&O audio system has been re-jigged with revised speaker placement for better staging, and it keeps a traditional three-band equalizer instead of forcing you to use Bang & Olufsen’s cursed tone circle of confusion.
However, I have a bone to pick with this particular version of Blue Cruise hands-free highway driver assistance. In the 28-mile highway stretch where I normally evaluate advanced driver assistance systems, I counted eleven interventions. Some were a result of other drivers’ behavior, and some were likely due to insufficient map data, but you know those right lanes that fork to an exit with no dotted line? This Explorer often wanted to aim itself at the safety cushions around the skinny end of the crash barriers and pray. That’s deeply concerning as the hand-off in such an event should be much earlier.
Three Things To Know About The 2026 Ford Explorer Tremor
- It has a real limited-slip rear differential.
- The optional V6 is a five-figure proposition due to option bundling.
- Unusually particular people can spec heated and ventilated seats and no sunroof at the same time.
Does The 2026 Ford Explorer Tremor Fulfill Its Purpose?
Yeah. It’s so vastly improved, you can’t help but wonder where the hell this version of the Explorer was in 2020. While it’s not as posh as a Hyundai Palisade, it feels as nice as a Toyota Grand Highlander, drives well, and the Tremor trim has proper goodies that make a difference when the going gets slippery. There are cheaper three-row crossovers out there, but few with fully-mechanical limited-slip rear differentials, or suspension tuning this dialed-in. A Mazda CX-90 or the aforementioned Hyundai Palisade are more refined on-road companions, but if your family does heaps of camping, the Explorer Tremor might be the move.
What’s The Punctum Of The 2026 Ford Explorer Tremor?
Possibly the best Otterbox’d three-row crossover on the market.
Top graphic image: Thomas Hundal
I’m seemingly in the minoroty here amongst the commentariat, but that’s ok.
I like it. It has an appealing package being RWD-based with some off-road goodies. The yellow-orange accents are tasteful, and the ones on the wheels indicating where the valve stems are are especially delightful.
I liked the Timberline trim better (especially with the green interior!) and the prior front end worked better with the grille-mounted light bar. The light bar treatment also resolved the triangular mismatch between the grille and the headlights all other Explorers of that generation had – even the Police Interceptor Utility – that oddly the Honda Accord also has. But by the same token I appreciate that this has the EcoBoost V6 available, even if it seems like overkill comparatively. I enjoyed that powertrain in an extended Lincoln Aviator (corporate twin to the Explorer) test drive.
One of my current vehicles is a Volvo XC90 V8 that I do light off-roading with (lots of family with working farms), and I could easily see something like this as a viable replacement. Not new, necessarily, and I might even lean more towards a Timberline and have the wheels’ valve stem pockets painted in the Timberline orange. I don’t need something as extreme as a Bronco or 4Runner, and something like an Aviator or newer XC90 wouldn’t match what I use the vehicle for. The fuel economy is about the same as my Yamaha-powered Swede gets.
Lastly, I’ll add that a lot of folks are comparing the Explorer to models like the Pilot, Pathfinder, Highlander, etc. Yes, they’re similarly-sized and -priced, but I (perhaps foolishly) don’t really see those as direct competitors to this, for the sole aspect of driven wheels. Being RWD-based elevates the Explorer to a different class, where yes, fuel economy is worse (especially without hybridization) but driving dynamics and serviceability improve thanks to the longitudinal powertrain setup. Unibody construction generally allows for a nicer ride and lower weight than body-on-frame. While there aren’t many direct competitors aside from the Grand Cherokee and Durango – Toyota’s RWD SUV models in the US are all body-on-frame; Mazda CX-90 is in the luxury field with Mercedes-Benz, Land Rover, and BMW where the Lincoln Aviator also plays, and everything else is FWD-based – I appreciate that it offers a RWD-based option smaller and lighter than the Expedition.
Does this model have the fake exhaust with the V6 and pumped in engine sound? That was a hard no from me when I looked at an ST.
Ford can’t launch a vehicle, simple as that. I don’t know what it is. Some of their vehicles end up solid and reliable, but usually not until the first refresh (at the earliest).
The pickups seem to be an exception to this (a few powertrain disasters aside, but there were always alternate powertrains available). Even the Maverick launched pretty smoothly, and it was their first unibody pickup. The truck division seems to be blessed with a basic level of engineering & manufacturing competence that the other divisions lack.
One important way the Explorer doesn’t get it right is the lack of a hybrid or plug-in hybrid option.
For me, I’d rather have a 0-60 time that is slower than the base model if it gives me vastly better fuel economy.
I don’t need a 6 second or faster 0-60 time for a daily driver. For me, even a 9 second 0-60 time is perfectly adequate.
What I want is way better fuel economy than either current engine options provide.
And all Ford needs to do is take the plug-in hybrid powertrain currently used in the Escape and made a version of it for the Explorer.
Not three rows, but for the same money, the Rivian R2 Performance Launch Edition looks like a much better value.
There have been reports that the rear differential in the 2020+ Explorers are consuming themselves. One of the prominent Ford techs I watch online goes so far as to say he will not recommend them.
The bigger picture/problem is that Ford can’t seem to build anything with gears in it anymore. Our ’16 Explorer grenaded it’s PTU at 61k (quite literally split the case wide open) after we didn’t change the ‘lifetime’ fluid because we don’t tow anything (did not meet the ‘severe’ service called out in the manual). The PTU the car came with was even equipped with a dedicated coolant cooling circuit and a temperature sensor in it that STILL couldn’t save it.
Many other 4WD Explorer owners have had the very same happen to them. Now the current generation Explorer gains a traditional transfer case and RWD architecture – but has a glass rear differential.
My ’14 Mustang has had two differential rebuilds and a used axle put under it – and it still makes noise. The MT82 transmission is also a knows POS with gear-shaped bits inside of it. Mine is thankfully as OK as an MT82 can be.
That’s just MY experience with Ford – there are so many other driveline issues that are self-inflicted at Dearborn.
I can’t for the life of me figure out how Ford is so bad at meshing gears properly…
I would think the S550/S650 diff is very similar to the Explorer and I have never heard them failing even under high horsepower.
The Mustang and Explorer differentials are similar but not the same. Most ’20+ Explorers have an 8.1″ ring gear whereas the Mustang has an 8.8.
This is not the sole reason for why ’20+ Explorers are eating rear diffs – but again there’s nobody using 8.1s for racing, and very few putting more than stock power levels through them.
“Look honey, the Sheriffs Department got some new units apparently… and those Wal-Mart CarPlay screens look amazing…”
No Hybrid option? Weird
This is new? Am I the only one that doesn’t see the difference between this and what came before?
A few grille tweaks go a long way. I found the previous iteration to be desperately ugly.
Maybe the the 2021 model sucked because it was built in 2020.
Ford had quality issues at CAP for a while, well before 2020 gummed up the works. idk if they’ve fixed it or not.