Developed from 1989 under the internal code 153T and launched in Japan in May 1994, the XA10 offered three- and five-door bodies on different wheelbases, plus a rare soft-top convertible three-door, body styles no RAV4 since has repeated.[1] It reached the US in January 1996 and was named Automobile Magazine’s 1997 Automobile of the Year. A separate battery-electric RAV4 EV, leased and briefly sold in California from 1997, is not authored as a trim here, since this entry covers the petrol range only.
Wikipedia’s own article gives no kerb weight for this generation, so this entry’s mass and weight-distribution figures instead come from NHTSA’s Canadian Vehicle Specifications register, matched to the closest available body/drivetrain combination (5-door AWD) rather than the base US 2.0 trim exactly as sold.