Toy Story 5 Official Trailer Drops: Woody and Buzz Reunite to Battle Tech Villain Lilypad in Pixar's Most Timely Sequel

The internet broke — and so did Woody's hairline. Pixar released the official Toy Story 5 trailer on February 19, 2026 ET, and within hours, fans were dissecting every frame of the 2½-minute clip, from the emotional reunion of Woody Toy Story's most beloved cowboy with Buzz Lightyear, to the jaw-dropping reveal of Woody's viral bald spot. The most hotly anticipated animated sequel in years is headed to theaters on June 19, 2026, and if the trailer is any indication, Pixar has crafted something that hits hardest for audiences who grew up watching the original in 1995 — a full 31 years ago.

What the Toy Story 5 Trailer Reveals About the Plot

The Toy Story 5 trailer opens with Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen) saying, "It's been too long, cowboy," before embracing a now slightly balding Woody (Tom Hanks) — a moment that sent fans into an immediate emotional spiral. The reunion picks up the threads left dangling at the end of Toy Story 4 from 2019, when Woody chose to leave Bonnie's room to help lost toys find new owners.

In the years since, Jessie (Joan Cusack) has stepped up as the de facto leader of Bonnie's toy chest, with Buzz serving as her second-in-command. But a new threat reshuffles the entire hierarchy: Lilypad, a frog-shaped smart tablet voiced by Greta Lee, arrives in Bonnie's life and quickly monopolizes every waking hour of the now-eight-year-old girl's attention. The toys treat this as nothing short of an extinction-level event for traditional playtime.

Woody, hearing that his friends are in trouble, returns to the fold. The gang — including Forky (Tony Hale), Slinky Dog (Blake Clark), Hamm (John Ratzenberger), Rex (Wallace Shawn), and Jessie — must figure out how to out-heart a device that can do almost everything. As Buzz declares in the trailer, "Our mission on this planet is to make a child happy." The trailer closes on the film's new tagline: "Times may change, but friends are forever."

Meet Lilypad: The Toy Story Villain for the iPad Generation

The central antagonist is Lilypad, a high-tech frog-shaped smart tablet voiced by Greta Lee, positioned as a sleek device with "disruptive ideas" about what is best for Bonnie. Unlike the franchise's past villains, Lilypad isn't evil in a cartoonish sense — she's simply more capable than the toys at almost everything. That's the point. The toys can't out-feature a screen, so they'll have to out-heart it — classic Toy Story logic where feelings, friendship, and play are the only real superpowers they've got.

Conan O'Brien voices a brand-new character named Smarty Pants, described as a toilet training tech toy, while Craig Robinson plays Atlas, a cheerful talking GPS hippo toy. These additions suggest Pixar is populating Bonnie's world with both traditional toys and tech-adjacent ones, setting up a generational clash inside a single child's bedroom.

Woody's Bald Spot Goes Viral — The Internet Reacts

No moment from the Toy Story 5 trailer generated more online heat than the reveal of Woody's thinning hair. Fans were quick to note that Toy Story debuted in 1995, making Woody effectively a 31-year-old toy — ancient by any measure. The bald spot sent social media into a frenzy of memes, jokes, and surprisingly emotional takes.

Many longtime fans read the detail as something deeper than a gag. Woody's bald spot is a visual symbol of aging that resonates with adult fans who watched the first film as kids and now see reflections of their own lives in these characters — making the cowboy feel real, aged by countless adventures and years of love from different owners. The choice has sparked broader conversations about how Pixar honors time and change rather than pretending these characters exist in a permanent state of factory-fresh newness.

Full Toy Story 5 Cast and Creative Team

Pixar has assembled one of the franchise's largest ensembles yet. Here's a breakdown of the confirmed voice cast:

The film is directed by Andrew Stanton, who co-wrote it with Kenna Harris. It will be the first main film in the franchise without any involvement from co-creator John Lasseter, and franchise composer Randy Newman returned to score the film — marking his tenth collaboration with Pixar.

How Toy Story 5 Connects to Toy Story 4

Toy Story 4, released in 2019, ended on a note that divided fans. Woody voluntarily left Bonnie's room behind, handing his Sheriff's badge to Jessie and embarking on a new life helping lost toys find owners alongside Bo Peep. It was a genuine goodbye, and Tom Hanks himself told Ellen DeGeneres at the time that it would be the final film in the series.

Seven years later, the world has changed enough to bring Woody back. The trailer teases the reunion of Woody and Buzz after Woody decided to leave the gang and start helping lost toys at the end of Toy Story 4. The premise of Toy Story 5 threads that needle carefully: Woody doesn't come back because the last film's ending was wrong. He comes back because Bonnie and his old friends genuinely need him in the face of a threat none of them anticipated — a tablet that doesn't just compete with toys, it makes toys feel unnecessary altogether.

Toy Story 5 Release Date and What to Expect This Summer

Toy Story 5 opens exclusively in theaters on June 19, 2026 — and it will have serious competition on that same date, including A24's The Death of Robin Hood starring Hugh Jackman. Still, no film on the summer calendar carries the franchise weight of a new Toy Story, particularly one that reunites Woody and Buzz for the first time in seven years.

Toy Story 5 is trying to do something both modern and classic: take a big cultural anxiety and translate it into a small, emotional story inside one child's room. If it works, it won't just be about toys fighting for relevance — it'll be about what changes, what stays, and why the characters still matter when the world around them keeps upgrading.

Pixar's longest-running franchise has always survived by evolving. Woody, Buzz, and the rest of the gang have faced obsolescence, abandonment, and the bittersweet reality of growing up. This time, they face the algorithm — and a frog-shaped tablet that thinks it knows better. Audiences will find out who wins on June 19.