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Road test review: Hyundai Ioniq 5

Sunday, 27 February 2022

This is Hyundai's newest all-electric SUV - the Ioniq 5.
The Ioniq 5 is a seriously cool looking car. Those wheels are meant to look like the aperture of a camera lens.
The Ioniq 5 is a seriously cool looking car. Those wheels are meant to look like the aperture of a camera lens.
The 3000mm wheelbase is actually longer than the Palisade, but you wouldn’t know it by looking.
The 3000mm wheelbase is actually longer than the Palisade, but you wouldn’t know it by looking.
The black roof here is actually a solar panel. It’ll give you around 10km of free range, provided you leave the car in the sun all day.
The black roof here is actually a solar panel. It’ll give you around 10km of free range, provided you leave the car in the sun all day.

The Ioniq 5 has been out for a couple of months now and has already gathered a handful of awards. Rightfully so, too, because it’s a fantastic EV. We’ve already had a go in the 72kWh Elite 2WD model, so now it’s time to see what you get when you go for the top dog.

OUTSIDE

Hyundai has used the 45 concept as design inspiration for the Ioniq 5, which in turn was penned after the Hyundai Pony, the first car to come from the company in 1975. And it looks absolutely fantastic, with pixel headlights, pixel taillights and wheels that are meant to look like the aperture mechanism in a camera lens.

**READ MORE:

* Hyundai debuts Seven EV concept

There’s no engine here, but you can store a few things beneath the plastic cover.
There’s no engine here, but you can store a few things beneath the plastic cover.

* Hyundai goes full-retro with Grandeur EV resto-mod

* Hyundai teases upcoming Ioniq 7 electric SUV

* Hyundai shows off Ioniq 5's sustainable interior

**

It’s not quite as large as you might think either, looking more like a big hatchback than a medium SUV. The wheels are pushed out to the corners, giving the interior more space without hogging more of the road.

The seats are designed for comfort first and foremost.
The seats are designed for comfort first and foremost.

I wish the stripe of squares stretching across the boot all lit up, or at least enough to create more of a full-width strip, but the only ones that do are enough to create squares for brake lights, indicators, and reversing lights. Still looks mint, though.

Our tester was fitted with the optional solar roof, which helps generate a bit of extra electricity without being plugged in. Before you start asking things like “why doesn’t every EV come with one of these?!” I can say that it’s because of two main factors. One: they are expensive, and two: they aren’t as efficient as you might expect.

There is a slim LED strip across the boot but I wish the whole thing lit up.
There is a slim LED strip across the boot but I wish the whole thing lit up.

See, EVs have big batteries, and solar panels of this size don’t actually generate that much power. You can assume it will regenerate around 10km per day, if it’s parked in the sun for most of the day. Doesn’t sound like much, but free energy is free energy.

INSIDE

The pixel theme doesn’t continue inside the Ioniq 5, which is good because that might look a bit strange. Instead, Hyundai has kept things simple and minimal, with a two-spoke steering wheel (a trend I am very on-board with), a pair of digital screens, recycled fabric covering the harder plastics, and soft plastics elsewhere.

Those screens are high quality, keeping the simplistic theme going by only displaying crucial information. They still look premium though.

A new feature in the Ioniq 5 is what Hyundai calls the ‘Universal Island’, which is the sliding centre console. It’s not attached to the lower part of the dashboard, and can move forward and back by 140mm to allow “driver and passengers to freely enter and exit the cabin on either side when parked in a narrow spot.” It’s a bit odd, but it does work, in the admittedly small spectrum of situations that require it.

The Island will hold fairly large bits and pieces though, and sometimes it’s nice to drop a bag of takeaway Thai food in the cavity below the armrest and not worry about it spilling all over the seat or floor.

UNDER THE BONNET

Power in this, the top-spec Ioniq 5, is rated at 225kW/605Nm from a pair of electric motors, one per axle for all-wheel drive. The 72kWh battery they are fed by is enough to offer around 400 real-world kilometres of range, and it supports fast charging at up to 800 volts.

If you plug it into one of ChargeNet’s hyper chargers, you’ll go from ten to 80 per cent in less than 20 minutes, Hyundai says. Wallbox users will recharge the whole battery in around eight hours, while standard three-pin plugs take 37 hours.

The Ioniq isn’t meant to be a Tesla killer, it’s more aimed at daily driving with an “every now and again” approach to sporty stuff. That said, it still has a Sports mode, which spices up the throttle response and steering. It feels like the torque delivery is more instant in this mode too, compared to the other two modes, although power delivery is noticeably different in every mode.

Like Hyundai’s other EVs, the Ioniq 5 has paddle-operated regeneration, which adjust how much energy the system claws back via braking. Pulling the left paddle, as if you were changing down gears in an ICE machine, increases the regen, while tugging the right reduces it. Dropping it down to zero means the car will coast without any “engine braking”.

You can also opt to let the computers figure everything out and use the Ioniq in a ‘one pedal’ mode. It works well, but I preferred to use the paddles most of the time.

ON THE ROAD

About the only area the Ioniq stumbles a bit is the ride. It’s a bit harsh at low speed, a few too many judders getting into the cabin. On the motorway, it’s great, but at high speeds outside the city it can generate a bit of body roll. It’s nothing awful, mind, it’s just more than expected. You won’t hit much understeer, despite its roughly two-tonne mass and powered front axle, though.

The steering is fairly vague, despite being quite quick in Sport mode; it doesn’t offer a huge amount of feeling. Not the end of the world, considering the target market of city-dwelling families.

If that is a niggle for you, hold off on putting a deposit down just yet (sorry, Hyundai) because it’s rumoured the folks at the N division are working their magic on a sportier Ioniq 5.

Get the thing into the city and, aside from the ride, it’s lovely. The brakes don’t have much of the numbness that generally plagues systems with regenerative abilities, and the seats are nicely comfortable. I’m not a massive fan of the twisty gear selector mounted on the steering column, but you get used to it soon enough.

VERDICT

Hyundai’s latest dedicated EV is, on most counts, a real winner. It looks spectacular, goes well enough, and does a lot more for the environment than you might think. If Hyundai can give the ride a bit more of a tune and introduce more feeling into the steering, and maybe drop the price of the top-spec version, it’ll be damn near perfect.