The Dodge Durango Is Here to Stay
The third-generation Dodge Durango has been on sale for 15 years. Every time it seems like Stellantis, née Fiat Chrysler, is ready to move on, the big bruiser sticks around—as has its hardcore Hellcat variant. Now, Dodge is doubling down by offering a Jailbreak version, so buyers can customize their 710-horsepower super SUV however they like. Consider it a statement that the Durango will continue to be, as Dodge CEO Matt McAlear put it during an interview, a “staple” of the muscle car maker’s range going forward.
“Durango, I think, has proven itself because it is such a terrific package in a segment that is dominated by CUVs (crossover suvs), for a lack of better word,” McAlear said during a roundtable chat attended by The Drive. “Durango is the last V8 offered in the segment. It tows and performs like the segment above it, but it has garageability, parkability, drivability, handling characteristics like a segment below it.”
That combination, McAlear says, has given the Durango a niche practically all to itself, and earned it a lasting place in Dodge’s lineup alongside the family’s other big names.
“We’re committed to Durango now and in the future,” McAlear added, “And it is a staple. Just like we celebrated, you know, the 60th anniversary of Charger, it’s become a staple in the Dodge lineup.”
McAlear also reflected on the regulatory challenges behind the decision to initially make the Durango SRT Hellcat a 2021 model-year vehicle only. The Hellcat took a year off in 2022 but ended up returning in 2023, after some “fiddling with ones and zeroes in the engine’s software coding” to meet emissions limits, Dodge said at the time. It’s remained ever since.
“As far as the Hellcat, you know, when we did that—when we came out with the first year—we were anticipating regulatory challenges that weren’t going to let us do this for the time that we’ve been running the Hellcat now, over the last few years,” McAlear said. “Things evolved, the markets evolve, regulation evolves. We were excited.”
The Durango Hellcat Jailbreak presents an opportunity for Dodge to, in the chief executive’s words, “give consumers what they’ve been asking for and what they want.” But it also signals perhaps the zenith for the third-gen Durango, before it’s finally replaced.
McAlear didn’t speak on the next Durango during our chat, but it seems the timeline for the current SUV’s replacement has shifted considerably over the past several years, at times reportedly including an electric variant as well as a smaller, two-row version supposedly named “Stealth.” Recent market and regulatory shifts may have sunk both of those spinoffs, though the fourth-gen Durango is coming; the real question is when. The UAW said in January that it would be built at Detroit Assembly, but a more recent rumor suggests that it might not start rolling off the production line until 2028. That should give lovers of the Hemi-powered SUV plenty of time to get their last calls in.
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