Jaguar has given the world its first official look inside the Type 01, revealing a four-seat cabin that carries many of the ideas first seen on the Type 00 concept into the forthcoming production GT.
Until now, almost everything we have seen of the Type 01 has been disguised. Prototypes have covered thousands of development miles beneath increasingly familiar camouflage, but Jaguar has now revealed a little more by showing the interior completely undisguised, giving us perhaps our clearest indication yet of how its new design philosophy will translate from the concept car to production reality.
The answer is that rather more of the Type 00 has survived than some might have expected.
At the centre of the cabin – quite literally – is the dramatic spine first previewed by the concept. It runs longitudinally through the entire interior, separating the four occupants and creating four clearly defined individual spaces rather than the more conventional arrangement of front and rear benches divided by a centre console. Jaguar describes this as bringing its “concept car vision” into production.
It also provides an interesting connection with the exterior proportions of the Type 01. Much has already been made of the production car’s extraordinarily long bonnet and cab-rearward stance, and Jaguar’s designers have deliberately continued that longitudinal emphasis inside rather than following the predominantly horizontal architecture that has become commonplace in modern electric cars.
Jaguar says the seating position has been set low, with the cabin wrapping closely around the driver to create the feeling expected of a sporting grand tourer, with the driver occupying a defined cockpit area.
Whatever else the new Jaguar becomes, it still has to feel like a Jaguar from behind the wheel, and the low driving position of Type 01 is far removed from the high-set seating and commanding viewpoint that has come to dominate the premium SUV and EV market.
Where are all the buttons?
Rather than covering the cabin with displays or buttons, Jaguar has attempted to integrate the technology into the architecture and keep much of it hidden until required. There is a substantial digital display ahead of the driver, while a much smaller portrait-format touchscreen rises from the central spine to provide access to functions including climate and infotainment controls. Concealed storage and other functions are similarly intended to reveal themselves only when needed.
It is an approach Jaguar describes as technology “on demand”, and it marks a deliberate attempt to move away from the increasingly familiar wall-of-screens treatment adopted by many contemporary luxury cars with the ability to select a driving mode that folds away all the screens and allows a heads-up display to show just the essentials while you get on with the pleasure of driving, free of digital distractions.
One particularly unusual solution is the rear-view display. The Type 01 dispenses with a conventional interior mirror and instead uses Jaguar’s digital ClearSight system. Rather than positioning its screen where a mirror would traditionally sit, it is mounted centrally at the foot of the windscreen, broadly level with the exterior door mirrors. The idea is to reduce the amount the driver’s eyes must shift their line of focus when moving between different rearward views. As there is no conventional rear window, the camera system is fundamental to rearward visibility.
Look and feel
There is an emphasis on unusual materials and the absence of conventional luxury-car decoration. Jaguar cites travertine stone and artisan textiles as influences on the Type 01’s tonal palette, while a brass-inspired finish extends along the central spine and across the upper sections of the doors.
Small Jaguar leapers are incorporated into these pieces – a comparatively subtle use of one of the marque’s most recognisable symbols within an otherwise deliberately minimalist cabin.
Jaguar’s so-called ‘strikethrough’ graphics extend across the dashboard and visually correspond with elements on the bonnet beyond the windscreen. Viewed from above, the intention becomes clear: rather than treating the dashboard as the point at which the exterior design stops and the interior begins, the lines appear to continue through the car.
Thomas Holden, Jaguar Chief Interior Designer, explained that this longitudinal architecture was a deliberate rejection of the industry’s usual horizontal approach.
“In contrast to the horizontal interior design norm, we emphasise its dramatic longitudinal nature through the central spine – an architectural statement that creates four individual spaces.”
Holden added that the combination of authentic materials, technology on demand and flowing surfaces is intended to create the “drama and theatre” Jaguar believes should distinguish the modern luxury interior.
A very different kind of Jaguar
For existing Jaguar owners, there is obviously little here that immediately recalls an XJ, XK or F-TYPE cabin, and, if we are honest, it’s all quite “extreme Scandinavian minimalism” at first glance. Traditional timber, analogue instruments and rows of physical switchgear have gone, but that should hardly come as a surprise. Jaguar has repeatedly made clear that Type 01 is not intended to be an incremental replacement for one of its previous models.
Instead, this is the first production Jaguar to be designed around the company’s new dedicated Jaguar Electric Architecture (JEA), and the interior demonstrates just how extensively that clean-sheet platform is being exploited.
The important question for enthusiasts will therefore be whether some of the less tangible qualities of Jaguar interiors have survived: the low seating position, the sense of sitting in rather than on the car, the relationship between driver and controls and, above all, that feeling of occasion that has characterised the best Jaguars.
Jaguar Managing Director Rawdon Glover says that is precisely the intention.
“With Type 01, we wanted every journey to be an occasion, from how it drives to how it looks and how it makes you feel.”
He describes the combination of a GT driving position, deliberately restrained technology and dramatic styling as creating “an interior like no other”.
Next stop: New York
There isn’t much longer to wait for the remaining pieces of the puzzle.
A Type 01 prototype is making its North American debut during Monterey Car Week, wearing a distinctive new camouflage treatment, culminating in an appearance at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance on 16 August.
The complete production car will then finally be revealed in New York on 6 October 2026.
13 Responses
An unaffordable minimalist high speed dodgem car.
This product will alienate most Jaguar owners.
It will bankrupt the company.
Jaguar has died, and I’m very sad about it.
I’ve owned Mk1 and 2, XJR6(xj40), E type.
Currently I own an XJ308 is 26 years old, 1 owner(me) 32500miles with a Heritage Cert.
JEC member Cheshire region
Geoffrey, Let’s look at all the options good and bad and try to come up with ONE word to sum this up.
The good…..Something new and different that a younger generation wants?
Something bad……..It has absolutely no relationship to its heritage.
Do millenials have 300,000 dollars all in with tariffs ?
Do people over 50 want to pay 300,000 dollars for an EV that reminds them of THEIR up coming coffin?
So IMHO , with MY family history buying Jaguar / LandRovers for over 60 years !
A lifetime JEC member
A lifetime JCNA member….
Still driving my E Types, MK2s and has owned ever Jag/ Land Rover up to 3 years ago..
The one word I can sum it up as is……
ABORTION!
I love Wayne Scott! , stop drinking the kool aid
Love
Lifetime member
Gtjoey1314
Please AI Sir William and Norman Dewis!
Out of interest, did the E-Type have any “relationship to its heritage.”?
The guys at Jaguar need to wake up!!! Too little- too late.
Ive owned several XFs and F types great cars.
JLR is trying to appeal to a (not quite, but near enough) 100% new customer base while still pleading heritage. Heritage matters to your longstanding loyal customers, and I thought one of the fundamentals of staying in business was to treat your customers with utmost care. In the whole history of car production, has any company – single handedly – done more than JLR to alienate and abandon its existing customer base?
The Type 01 may, in itself, be a good car when compared to the perceived competition. We’ll have to wait and see. But few existing Jaguar owners could afford one. And new customers – quite rightly – won’t care what past Jaguar is alluded to in the design and drive experience.
Is it for me? No. Almost all ‘clean sheet’ Jaguars have significant teething problems.
Finally, look at the Porsche Taycan for problems that happened even when choosing batteries from a well-known supplier. And the Jaguar comes with a battery pack from a manufacturer with no proven experience in the automotive market.
I’m trying to think positive, and struggling!
I’m a design man, and very unsure here. Certainly full of jargon, if that’s what sells.
I’d need to see/understand Jaguar’s strategic plann (and the financials that underpin it) before judging; eg: how fast will a ‘range’ be launched; will there be progression for a wide-enough customer base, or will it be purely high net worth customers; where/how will heritage feature to give competitive advantage in markets that have forgotten/never heard of LeMans, etc?
Best of luck.
ps: lifelong Jaguar fanatic: XF Sportbrake day car; owner:XK150S, e-type DHC, e-type FHC, Mk11.
Member: JEC, XK Club.
Paul
I thought I would dislike the interior but I find myself really liking what I see here. The minimalism appears to be very well done. The driving position, as described, and the prior reviews of the actual driving feel sounds very much Jaguar. I’m guessing this Jaguar will be received very well once people get the chance to see and drive it in the flesh. Of course, all pending the actual price tag.
I do wonder about the controls on demand though. How many (virtual) buttons does one need to tap in order to get to the desired control. And what is the delay in then getting to the control? How long will my eyes need to be off the road? However, with the way the rest of this car has come about, I’m going to assume the Jaguar engineers have done a good job of designing this aspect.
I think all the negative comment is very short sighted. Jaguar cars have been losing money for years because they simply could not compete with the German brands. Jaguar loyalists have not been able to keep the brand afloat. Now, if they stayed in the mass market they would have to compete with a wave of cheaper Chinese models, heavily subsidized by the Chinese government. No chance. So, in my view, they had to try something different. In its heyday Jaguar was an aspirational brand beyond the means of ordinary motorists like me. High end cars require fewer customers and they will have other cars so the Type 01 can afford to be exceptional. As much as we older Jag fans love it, the Jaguar heritage means less and less in the market place. So just producing a new more expensive XJ with the visual hallmarks of Jaguars of old would not cut it now. After the initial shock, I rather liked the 001concept and I could definitely see the link to the SS1 coupe with its long bonnet and low roofline. I hope it succeeds and I wish Jaguar well!
Lets give it some time and sleep on it. It looks like nothing else and is a show stopper. What we’d expect if Apple moved into making cars.
Tony B, Mk2 owner for 35 years
An egotistical design project that is up there with all the other expensive design projects that never made it to fruition. Jaguar were a unique car company that produced really lovely cars a cut above its competitors. Their downfall is possibly because of not charging enough for their cars originally compared with rivals in the same class produced in Germany and then not investing into future marks and dealing with the unions more sensibly. Unfortunately nothing can be done about that now however perhaps someone may get the idea to re-introduce all the things that made Jaguar a great car company including its badging and marketing and history. Then produce very usable, well designed looking cars even if they are ICE, Hybrid and electric with pricing that enables the company to survive and flourish but set at a level that people can aspire to and feel they have chosen well. Mercedes have managed it so why not Jaguar.
I can’t think of anything to say that those before haven’t already said, other than the RE GT already out there and eating Type 01’s lunch.
Today I’ve put a deposit on my 3rd XF after three X-Types.
This to desperately stave off the end of my days as a Jaguar Driver, Jaguar Enthusiast, a JEC Member and a JEC Region Chair.
How very sad all round.
It behaves our Club to now focus down on ‘traditional’ Jaguars, by which I mean ALL Jaguars up to 2024. Else the JEC will die, probably alongside JLR becoming merely LR.
Enzo Ferrari allegedly said of the E Type that there was only one thing wrong with it and that was that it did not have the Ferrari badge on the front. Here, we could say that the Type 01 is a very brave technical and styling experiment, the only thing wrong with it is that it has the Jaguar name on it!
The (bold, strategic?) move by Jaguar management was conceived at a time when they thought that the move to EV would be much faster than is actually going to be the case, and you can see in some of the changes from the Type 00 that they are trying to row back slightly from the earlier extreme positions that they took. But it is too late for any big changes. Most companies when trying to make a big strategic change would choose not to do this in a way that completely wasted all of the brand goodwill built up over many decades – so instead, for example, create another brand or sub-brand to carry the risk, not waste all the intangible value created by the historic marque. Whatever you think of the technical and aesthetic value of the Type 01, what is clear is that JLR management have committed a big error in wasting so much brand value and customer loyalty. As a former Jaguar apprentice, current E Type and XK owner, JEC Member and lifelong Jaguar devotee, I wish them well. But it did not have to be like this.
Still waiting to see if there will be any semblance of the elegance that symbolises Jaguar. But I rather fear that it will not be there, and there will be a horrible blunt-nosed thug of a car, just like all the others these days, even Rolls Royce. Whenever I leave my Jaguar I cannot resist looking back to admire the elegance of line that epitomises what Jaguar is all about. I fear that nobody will do that to 01. Opportunity to make a statement missed. Shame.