Pickup trucks and V8 engines go together like peas and carrots. But powerful new V6s, I6s, and even turbocharged I4s are increasingly popular in trucks. Most pickup manufacturers offer an alternative to the traditional V8, and one company has tossed its V8 altogether. But not Nissan: every 2022 Nissan Titan comes with a 5.6-liter, naturally-aspirated V8.

Is the Nissan Titan V8 a good engine?

Nissan’s 400-horsepower V8 has plenty of “punch” and an intoxicating exhaust note. But its fuel mileage is nothing to brag about and its tow rating lags behind other V8-powered pickup trucks.

Nissan set out to engineer and manufacture a classic, American-made pickup truck. And the Titan, assembled in Mississippi, is the result.

Nissan only offers its Titan with one powertrain option: a 5.6-liter Nissan V8 paired with a Jatco-built 9-speed automatic transmission. It’s a very sporty pickup truck, reaching 60 mph in 6.7 seconds.

The EPA gave the 2WD Nissan Titan a fuel economy rating of 16 city/21 highway mpg while its 4WD twin falls to 15 city/20 highway mpg. But in real-world use it may fall a bit short of this rating: Consumer Reports and TFL Truck both report a 16 mpg average while testing the Titan.

Finally, the Titan’s maximum towing capacity is just 9,320 pounds. This lags a bit behind the maximum tow rating of some of the competition. But with no entry-level engine options available, the Titan’s minimum towing capacity is still a healthy 9,040.

Does the Nissan Titan have a Cummins?

Nissan caught the attention of Ram fans when it began offering its medium-duty Titan XD with a Cummin-built diesel engine. This diesel V8 was different than the I6 available in Rams and was only available from 2016 through 2019.

Nissan also offers a “medium-duty” Titan XD. This Nissan Titan XD has a completely different chassis and suspension, bumping its tow rating to 10,920 pounds. This actually puts it at the bottom end of the “heavy-duty” truck category, home to the Ford F-250 and the 2500s from Ram, Chevrolet, and GMC.

For three years, Nissan offered this XD with a Cummins-built V8. But this was not the same industrial-grade I6 turbodiesel made famous by Ram’s heavy-duty trucks. It was a 5.0-liter, turbocharged V8.

This Cummins engine, called the ISV, made a respectable 555 lb-ft of torque. But if you are dreaming of a diesel Titan, you’ll have to find one used.

The 2022 Toyota Tundra offers no V8 engine option

Nissan redesigned its Titan and Titan XD pickup trucks for the 2019 model year and doubled-down on its V8 engine. Instead of a more efficient engine, Nissan chose to upgrade to a 9-speed automatic transmission and keep its beloved V8. But Toyota adopted the opposite strategy.

Toyota released the third generation of its full-size Tundra pickup truck for the 2022 model year. This all-new pickup truck tossed rear coil springs in the favor of leaves, abandoned the metal bed to swap to a composite unit, and deleted its V8 engine to focus on a twin-turbocharged V6.

Like Nissan, Toyota only offers one engine option in its full-size truck. For years, the Tundra was powered by a 5.7-liter V8. But for the truck’s third-generation Toyota engineered a new turbo V6. This engine makes more power than the outgoing V8 and claims much better fuel mileage. Will it win over truck fans? We’ll just have to wait and see.

You can read more about the decision to kill the Toyota V8 or see TFL Truck’s long-term test of the Nissan Titan in the video below: