The 2025 Honda CR-V Fuel Cell will include a plug-in power-sharing feature, the automaker revealed with a short video that also offers the best look yet at the crossover’s design.
The video shows a camouflaged CR-V Fuel Cell being used to power a coffeemaker at a roadside stop. In what some automakers term vehicle-to-load, or V2L, it’s plugged into a charge port in the front fender.
2025 Honda CR-V Fuel Cell
A closer look, as well as an accompanying press release on Honda’s Japanese-language website, also hints that the hydrogen fuel-cell version of the CR-V might have slightly different styling from other versions. The grille on the camouflaged vehicle seen in the video looks slightly larger and more elaborate, for example.
Honda announced the CR-V Fuel Cell in 2022—and confirmed at that time it would be a plug-in hybrid and would include home-charging capability (albeit not fast-charging). Last year the automaker showed the new fuel-cell module set to power the CR-V, explaining that it works at lower temperatures and has quicker startup times than previous-generation hardware. The fuel-cell stacks themselves are shared with General Motors in this generation.
Honda’s last fuel-cell effort, the Clarity Fuel Cell, was quiet, responsive, and comfortable, but infrastructure issues got in the way of adoption—even in California where the infrastructure is relatively widespread. It was discontinued after the 2021 model year.
In addition to the CR-V Fuel Cell, Honda is also working on a fuel-cell semi truck project with Isuzu. Meanwhile, Honda’s fuel-cell partner GM is packaging the tech into 2,000 Navistar semis powered by what GM is calling « Hydrotec fuel-cell power cubes. »
