LONDON (Reuters) - British luxury carmaker Bentley said on Thursday it will launch its first electric car in 2026 and said it will keep selling plug-in hybrids until 2035, formally abandoning a previous goal of going fully electric by 2030.

"Bentley to introduce SUV EV in 2026 and extend PHEV sales to 2035" was originally created and published by Just Auto, a GlobalData owned brand.

Finally, Bentley says it has found the winning formula to giving an all-electric vehicle the Bentley stamp of approval.

However, the automaker now plans to launch just the one EV, confirmed by Walliser on Thursday as an SUV, and will add more depending on how the market turns. Walliser said Bentley is open to launching a new EV or plug-in hybrid every year after the first EV, and currently targets a switch to a fully electric lineup by 2035.

Luxury automaker Bentley unveiled a change to its “Beyond100" initiative on Thursday, announcing it will now keep manufacturing plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) until 2035.

Bentley is set to become the latest brand to introduce its own EV—a crossover SUV of course—scheduled for a 2026 debut. According to CEO Frank-Steffen Walliser, the "luxury urban SUV" will be around 197 inches in length,

Bentley Motors has set 2026 for the debut of its first fully electric SUV, marking a major milestone in its shift to an all-electric range by 2035 under the "Beyond100+" strategy. Described as the world’s first true luxury urban SUV,

Bentley will unveil its first electric vehicle, an urban SUV, by 2026. This model will be one of the 10 EV and plug-in hybrid models to be launched by Bentley in the next decade. It will be one of 10 EV and plug-in hybrid models to be launched in the space of a decade.