I'll bet it's a dilly of a story...

The real story is there were and are are a limited supply of key fob chips relative to demand since at least Oct 2022. Toyota decided a single key allowed them to make twice as many cars for at least nine months until then started rationing out second keys based on delivery date.

They also decided to reduce limited battery resources going to plugins in favor of many more hybrids with lower capacity batteries.

As a result 2023 was an all time sales record for Toyota with hybrids representing a 37% increase.

So yes, Toyota chose sales volume and hybrids over two keys and plugins. Most of us were glad to get a car instead of no car and no key.

During the single key car sales period, US parts warehouses (not dealers) had a small key supply adequate to handle owners who damaged or lost their key.

My understanding is most owners paid for the lost key and had their ecus cleared of the original key in the process.

 

our '24 hycam from last summer came with two

 

Toyota makes cars with two different kinds of fobs; the older design and the newer(the older design is getting phased out as the models are updated). Your 2024 was the final year of the older design on the Camry. The 2025 Camry comes with the newer design. Each design uses different chips inside. There were supply issues with both chips, but the shortage was resolved faster with the older design(probably because Toyota was ramping down usage of the older chip and ramping up usage of the newer chip). That's why you got two (old) fobs and other owners are still waiting for their second (new) fob.

 

is gen 5 secure from hackers?

 

Ah, the good ol' days of dumb keys: no chips, duplicates for $5 at the shoe repair place.

 

And kids hot wiring them for you tube videos.

 

Is hot wiring a car easier than cruising with an electronic hacking device?

 

Ask the Kia owners that are getting their cars stolen at extremely high rates.

 

I got my letter for my 2nd key fob a couple months back.
Haven't had time to get to the dealer.

Not that big an issue for me obviously.

 

that's what i've read. all they get is a blank fob that has to be programmed to your car with tech stream.

 

dealers have been profiteering for ever, and more so since covid

 

When I got my second keyfob, they said it would take 90 minutes! Given it took 3 minutes to pair my phone to be a keyfob, I was shocked! I had planned on a 10-minute in/out visit and they took all that time. My car pinged my phone several times, so it wasn't just in queue all that time either. Very weird.

Will