It’s not a secret that car companies, even our domestic brands, make vehicles sold outside the United States. We also know these companies make some vehicles that never cross the border into our country. If you’ve never heard of the Chevrolet Montana, it’s not surprising. This small pickup truck is built in Brazil and sold in South America. It doesn’t make its way northward to the North American market, but maybe it should.

2023 ushers in a third generation of the Chevrolet Montana

That’s right, there have been two generations of this little truck already, and you probably didn’t know about either of them. This truck offered a coupe-ute layout in previous generations, making it look much less like a truck. Chevrolet used the new generation change to revamp the Montana into a real truck. In fact, it looks like this little Chevy pickup could take on the Ford Maverick and Hyundai Santa Cruz if it ever headed northward.

Brazilians will love the roominess of the Montana

According to Auto Evolution, the new Chevrolet Montana will be the roomiest pickup truck in its class. This truck competes with the Fiat Toro, Renault Oroch, and Ford Maverick in Brazil. The Toro uses the same platform as the Jeep Renegade and Compass and is the class leader in South America.

What powers the Chevrolet Montana?

This little truck will likely use the same engines and transmissions found in the Tracker and Onix. All three vehicles ride on the Global Emerging Markets platform. The engine should be a 1.2-liter turbocharged Ecotec three-cylinder engine producing 131 horsepower and 154 lb-ft of torque. This engine mates to both manual and automatic transmissions in the other two vehicles on this platform.

New tech and more versatility without specifics

Chevrolet attempts to keep most of the details under wraps about the new Montana. They offered that this little truck will be more versatile and offer new technologies compared to what it previously offered. We can only speculate this could be a midgate, which was a success for the Avalanche and part of the upcoming Chevrolet Silverado EV.

Will the Chevy Montana come to the USA?

Motor 1 tells us there isn’t any indication the Chevy Montana will head to the US at this time, but it’s not something to rule out. As long as the Maverick and Santa Cruz continue to be as popular as they are, GM will want a piece of the compact pickup truck market. Considering the Montana already exists, it wouldn’t be difficult for the company to ship this truck northward and put it on the roads in the US.

Unibody pickups are the next big thing

Before today, you might not have known that GM made a unibody truck. In North America, the longest-running unibody model is the Honda Ridgeline, but things got a lot more interesting when the Maverick and Santa Cruz emerged. Small, unibody pickups show they can be useful and comfortable, making them an important part of the truck world going forward. With this in mind, it would make sense for GM to bring the Chevrolet Montana to the United States, but right now, there’s nothing that says they will.

Check out the next article to learn more about why a diesel engine is right for your Chevy truck.