When Acura announced that the Integra is coming back, hardcore Honda fans were understandably excited – after all, it’s only one of Honda’s most iconic nameplate of all time. But as they say, reality is often disappointing, and it might just be the case here once again. Well, at least in China, anyway.
Photos of a new Honda Integra sedan in China has surfaced onto the interwebs, and as you can already see from the photos, looks like it’s just a regular 11th-generation Honda Civic sedan with a slightly tweaked exterior design.
The photos, as usual, came from China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology’s website. Based on the badging on the tailgate, we gathered that the Honda Integra will be a model unique to Guangqi Honda, while Dongfeng Honda will be selling the regular Civic sedan alongside it.
Confusing for us who live in the rest of the world, but it’s actually quite a common strategy for carmakers in China and several other countries, due to their collaborations with different local companies.
Anyway, up front, the Integra can be seen with a new, slimmer set of headlights, flanking the redesigned and slightly more regular-looking front grille. The bumper is also reworked with a more minimalist look and smaller intakes.
Moving over to the rear, the Chinese Honda Integra also gets a reworked tail light assembly featuring a more three-dimensional design, paired to a slightly tweaked bootlid. From what we can see, there also seems to be at two different types of rear bumpers available – one with exposed tailpipes, and one without.
The rest of the car, though, is recognisably and undeniably a Honda Civic.
It’s sleek, sure. And frankly, we’d be overjoyed if Honda unveiled this as the 11th-gen Civic sedan from the get-go instead. But alas, it’s called the Integra, and based on what we’ve seen wearing the iconic nameplate, this sure doesn’t feel like one, and we can’t help but feel disappointed.
Still, we remain cautiously optimistic for the “international” version of the Honda Integra – if it even exists – since the headlights from the teaser image does look quite different from this. The accompanying image of its silhouette also seems to suggest more of an aggressive coupe-like model, rather than a regular ol’ sedan.
Our hopes are up, but Honda, please, don’t do this again.
