Mystery Chery lifestyle ute headed to Australia

Chery has trademarked the exterior design of what looks to be an SUV-based lifestyle ute – in style of the Hyundai Santa Cruz, Ford Maverick, etc – with intellectual property Australia (IP), and intriguingly, the corresponding wagon. But not all is what it seems, as the SUV is the ute fitted with an almost perfectly integrated canopy.

Way back in 2022, Chery confirmed it was planning at least two monocoque lifestyle utes and a tougher ladder-frame offering to help it make it to the big leagues Down Under.

The trail went cold for a while afterwards until late last year when a ladder-frame prototype surfaced in China before design patents were filed with international IP offices, including Australia’s, and a production model was confirmed for our market next year.

But things really kicked up a notch in October when the Chery T1TP concept debuted as a monocoque lifestyle ute that could be converted into a seven-seat SUV via a modular “quick-release structure”, adjustable dividers and removeable (third row) seats.

The concept looked rugged and tough despite riding on the same platform as the familiar Tiggo 8, but the pod and its associated hardware wasn’t the most subtle of units.

That’s not the case with the local design patents, which reveal a setup that’s far more elegant and better integrated than before.

In fact, the renders are so refined you might need a second look to realise it’s actually a canopy and not just a standard three-row SUV.

In ute form, there’s no mistaking it for any other sort of vehicle – especially since it sits lower to the ground that most utes and looks to have a shorter tub, reminiscent of the KGM Musso.

The production version of the T1TP will be called the Tiggo X and positioned within Chery’s expanding SUV line-up. It’s expected to arrive in late 2026 or early 2027.

Given how generic the front and rear aprons of rendered vehicles are, we anticipate the patent submissions to revolve around the body structure and configurable rear end rather than the finished design – the T1TP looks far more modern, aggressive and is a much better fit with Chery’s current design language.

The brand’s local arm said it didn’t “have any further information on these vehicles at this time” when contacted by carsales about the submissions, which does next to bugger all to shed some light on the situation.

Competition for the Tiggo X will primarily come from the Deepal E07 which similarly blurs the line between ute and SUV, while other more traditional models like the Kia Sorento, Hyundai Santa Fe, Toyota Kluger, and MG QS can be classed as rivals based on size and budget.

This article originally appeared on carsales.