A new large electric SUV with a significantly high range. This is the Kia EV9, Kia's new flagship. It's an electric SUV and finally, we have a large EV that is not in the super high-top premium segment. Could this be, at this moment, the best large EV to go for? We'll find out.
Let's go, starting with the front, really strong. This is the GT line, so this top is sporty trim. You can see here the daytime running light in a vertical way, and we have a beautiful matte blue color. I mean, this looks amazing, doesn't it? The GT line also features more sporty features, for example, here also towards the side. We have 21-inch wheels and also in this I would almost say a concept car-like design, 19-inch would be the base wheel and we have the contrasting wheel arch in the high gloss black than here in the GT line. We can see these kinds of strange side mirrors here.
These are the optional camera mirrors, but you would also start with normal mirrors if you rather prefer that. Here at the side profile, we can see a very angular line, so it goes against the modern trend of creating these aerodynamic bulb designs and so on and I think it just looks stunning. Turning indicator check, looks pretty amazing here in front how it replaces the data morning light, doesn't it? 5.01 meters or 197 inches is the lengthiest, so really a Length and RWD or AWD full-size SUV indeed. Either rear-wheel drive with a small battery around 8 seconds in the acceleration figure or 9 seconds with a bigger battery. And if you go with a bigger battery, you can also go all-wheel drive, then you have one electric motor per axle, and then you get less than 6 seconds to 1 kilometer or 62 miles an hour. So, that is significantly quick for such a large vehicle indeed.
The top speed is 200 kilometers an hour or 125 miles an hour for the all-wheel drive version, and 185 kilometers an hour or 115 miles per hour for the rear-wheel drive version. Once again, so strong, really angular, against the trend indeed. , it doesn't look EV at all, and I'm absolutely sold on the exterior. What about you? Turning indicators in the rear, looks pretty amazing, doesn't it? Here with this really single-element design.
Frunk and battery kWh sizes
Is there a frunk? Yes, there is one. It's small but definitely leaves enough space for a cable and you can easily open it from the inside of the vehicle. As for the battery sizes, by the way, either 76-kilowatt hours or 100 kilowatt-hours and that will probably translate into a real-world range of either 400 kilometers, 250 miles, or 500 kilometers, 300 miles. Recharging will be possible with the 800-volt architecture, bringing you a 10% to 80% state of charge in about 25 minutes.
EV9 base in Silver
And here, a silver vehicle as a contrast. This is not the GT line, so a baseline, but already looks quite strong. Of course, you don't have so much black contrast, but rather a silver contrast in the lower part. Which one do you like better? Here, the base version you can see has different turning indicators, not the vertical one, but a kind of separate one inside, but also looks cool, doesn't it? On the side here, these are 20-inch, so basically in between, but design-wise, definitely prefer the GT line.
well, you can get also more designs. This is to me a little bit too close, of course, thinking about aerodynamics and so on. This is how it looks like when the mirrors fold. in or out together with the door handles, either here in the flush setup and then accessible. And here with the silver car, you can see very well here in the side profile how the glass housing is really embodied by the vehicle colors and horizontal stress. And finally, a silver looks for the rear. By the way, a heat pump is also featured with this vehicle.
Interior GT-Line
Then here, the doors, you can see here these are flush door handles, they go in when you close the vehicle. The door closing sound was really solid indeed, then inside of the doors, rather a soft touch here, nice fabric insert, this then here is a little bit softer even, this then here the screen for the digital mirrors, but once again just an option, a lot of options here as well, heated steering wheel, cool seat, heated seat and everything with real buttons, easy to control.
I really like that. And this interior is also pretty futuristic indeed. The horizontal focus area with this one-screen design and the seats are particularly interesting. These are the GT line seats, so they have this dual-tone scheme as well, with a lot of controls. This is then the button for the relaxation function, then it goes backward actually, and the material is bio-PU, so it's all animal free, even the steering wheel, and they don't use raw oil, but for example, castor oil and corn as a base, so plant-based oils, and material as a base. to create these seats together with a lot of recycling share and other parts so they are really going full circle as for sustainability that's top-notch and super comfortable indeed the material quality is amazing so also have this as perforation sea cooling You have very good command driving position and you see this large hood in front of you, you really get a large SUV feeling.
There is plenty of headroom left even with 189 or 6 foot 2. There's also the small panoramic roof. panoramic roof, not quite, but just a small glass roof, you could actually really open it, and why not? This shade here is just manual, and then the rear seats, have another separate small glass roof. Interior cockpit overview in the GT line. two 12.3-inch screens, a horizontal layout, and the cool thing is the climate unit is still here with manual control. I love that, colder and also warmer, and then here the vent strength, so straightforward still.
You have these hotkeys that are basically integrated here and they give you some kind of haptic feedback, for example, and here you can access the map. The cool thing here now, upgraded with the EV9, they also have now route planning for your charging stops, so it automatically calculates the charging stops and then also preheats the battery when you have a charging station set. This is really important. Then the steering wheel here, in and out, up and down. Once again, really good volume jogs here, rear buttons at the steering wheel, they found a good user interface, the shifting lever is here, you put it forward like this in drive mode, right side P and back to reverse, so this is really you step in the vehicle and you directly know where is what.
Then, in the lower part, you have this huge middle console, you could put up this here, then you have an inductive charging pad underneath for your smartphone, and in the front, you can slide this one open and everything resonates very well. This is premium quality indeed. Push these here and then you have two large cup holders that are even adaptive and below the middle tunnel you also have more space. Digital instruments are clear to read, simple, and straightforward indeed. You can adjust them a little bit actually what you want to have in the middle and you also get a head-up display. a quick up-close look at the infotainment. Here you have this main menu with these tiles.
Car wash mode is interesting because it sets up the vehicle so that you can go into the car wash without getting wet, for example, so it automatically closes the sunroof and so on. Why not? And you can see these hotkeys are working, and the map is also, let's say, decently responsible, but of course, you could always go for Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, but then you don't have the pre-calculation for the charging stops. Particularly interesting here, is the USB-C charger, USB-C charger, the second one, and then you can switch it from only charging to charging and connecting, and then also your Apple CarPlay or Android Auto is being activated, both wired though.
Rear 6-seater swivel seats
Rear seats, actually everything that resonates with the quality, it's really nice here, sounds and when you feel, when you touch everything, very good. opens quite wide, so you can easily access the rear seats. This is where the single-seat setup, which is pretty cool, like captain seats, in this case in a six-seater, so two, two, two with the third seating row. You can also get a through the bench, then you have three seats in the second seating row, then you have a seven-seater, and for this six-seater, you have two different setups.
Either you get a relaxation seat, then you can not only put the back part in the rear. You can have the same function as the front seats, you know, like with the car thrust and it goes a little bit like that for like this sleeping position or like this you have the swivel seat. First of all, you can go front and rear normally on this, you know, on this slider but then the swivel seat has this separate lever here and then you can, now it gets really funny, you can either do it like this, I mean it could be like a lookout position, for example, or maybe like a picnic position, like when all the crumbles are falling to the ground and not inside the vehicle. You know what I mean. Kids, you know, don't crumble in daddy's or mother's car, right?
And then we can also go around. And now it gets really interesting. Yeah. And now you're having a great laugh now. This must look amazing. So, and then I can go all the way around, yeah, like this. And then I can go back. Can I go back? when, you know, when the front seat is a little bit more to the front, it would be better. So you can turn it like really like 180 around and you can have like a family chat or something, but you can see here the space is limited. So I need to be, you know, going more back to this on the slider here, but then the front seat can't be in position.
Look at that. even seat heating and seat cooling are available for the second row. That's amazing. They really thought about the rear passengers. You have cup holders, and USB-C chargers in the seats, and then you can pull out this one here, and it serves either as a tray, or you can also open this one, and have another large box. What about the third seating row here?
3rd seating row
Well, it is considered decently comfortable, also because of the soft seats, Also, with this perforation, you also have ISOFIX, you can install child seats here. When I have the second row, the way I could still sit in there, then it's, you know, hardly possible for me to sit behind that. So, for adults in the rear, not quite. So, either for child seats or, you know, when children are not that tall yet.
Trunk/boot 6-seater
Let's check out the trunk. 730 liters when the third row is down. Very interesting because, look at that, the width here in the rear, that's enormous, like 130 meters or 55 inches. The third row is up, but it's really easy to fold this one down. This is the manual function. And then for this second row, in this case here, single seat setup, but you can also get the bench. Two buttons here, and then they easily fall down. Wow, look at that. So the normal trunk length here,
This is like 115 meters or 45 inches to this one and then to the driver's seat like 2.15 meters or 85 inches.
The base interior is a grey
The second interior here, the Baseline with fabric, grey fabric, and grey leatherette, looks cool. And then in the lower part of the door, you can see this really large door sill that protects the interior from getting muddy also in the lower part or like the entry badge and so on. And you can see this different layout here also for the seats and the steering wheel also looks quite attractive. I think it's a cool thing that They didn't go like this just plain black everything, you know, this looks interesting, but it's still subtle enough You know what I mean?
So sometimes you have boring interiors or you have like, you know orange green over the top Here, I think they found a good solution. Look at here the seats once again The um, the all-vegan seats as well perforation good material quality is also very soft and then for the headrest you always have fabric and that's also a very soft cushion Once again, think of it when you have the relaxation seats function, then you really have a very soft cushion for your head and they can maybe like to take a power nap while quick charging. Do you like this interior better here or the GT line?
Here, by the way, also very interesting structures right here, and once again, they brought down the CO2 output through the whole process with all of the materials they picked. This base version here, for example, has the manual steering wheel control, but that feels also really good. And yeah, I mean, why not?
What I also appreciate is that you can directly pick the drive modes at the steering wheel. Then see the vehicle with the standard mirrors, definitely prefer these, don't you? And everyone, please thank Leah for the camera work today, and she appreciates this function. Look at that, the mirror there in the sunshade is really large.
Rear 7-seater bench
The second rear setup is the through bench. You can see here a one-third, two-thirds split. I moved the one-third part forward. This one I moved backward and you can see the difference there too. And then, let's take a seat. The seat comfort is, I would say, comparable to the captain seats. The captain seats, of course, are a little bit more fun because the middle part is free. You can directly go through the rear seats, but this can also be more practical depending on your use case, of course.
And then, you can also vary the rear part here, and you can slide it forward or backward, and that goes quite easily. Headroom here in the rear, by the way, with 189 or 6'2", is also no problem at all. Here, by the way, very nice. A soft ceiling that feels really good as well. What's also interesting is that we can directly slide this bench here, so we have one button here on the top, and then when I press this one, we could lay it here like this, and then you can easily access the rear Just that I'm now in a bad position. Okay. Took a trip around now. Here, what I also want to show you here, is the manual sunshade, and it goes really wide all over the screen here.
It's really cool. So good for the kids in the rear. And then, let me get inside. So, this works as well, and I've put this one here a little bit more forward now, and you can see, once again, yeah, it does not fit that well for tall, tall, tall, but overall, it's nice to have this flexibility also for more child seats or for, you know, like smaller children or something in the rear.
For the second seating row, you have your own AC unit in the ceiling, and I love how they pay attention to details here. This feels also good, looks cool here, open or close the vents, and they can also adjust them here, so open, close the vents, and then slide them around like this for the rear passenger. It's pretty cool. And here is a quick example of how the base version is a little bit simpler. You just have, you know, this cubby hole right there. You don't have this slider where you can slide it out and without the tray and so on, but you can, of course, also live with that.
7-seater trunk/boot
The trunk of the 7-seater is actually quite the same. Here you can see this through the bench and then the same mechanism, put them forward, Super easy, straightforward, look at that loading area. That's really amazing indeed. Then here in the front, by the way, there's some more space underneath here, but just barely. This is, for example, storage in here for this rear cover, but cables, they rather think that you store them in the frunk in the front there. You also have a 12-volt supply here, then you have a reel. 250-volt supply here, but of course, you can also use the vehicle-to-load function at the outset of the vehicle, so both are possible, like for the camping mode. And then, by the way, if you want to put up the third seating row again, it's so easy, just pull these here like this and secure it here in your favorite position like this,
Is it the best large EV?
That's it. Two things remain to be seen. For example, if you can also drive in Europe with the seats facing backward, regulations are not clear yet, and also if the smaller battery will also come to the European market. Overall, you can say it is one of the best proposals for a large EV at this moment. Definitely, we can say so. We, of course, keep you up with driving, also check about the real-world range and so on, and you can tune in, for example, to our Kia EV6 GT review or maybe if you think about a large EV sedan, recent VW ID.7.
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