Hyundai Ioniq 6 Ultimate AWD review

Hyundai IONIQ 6

Hyundai Ioniq 6 Ultimate AWD review.

For – handsome, high quality, terrific drive.
Against – it’s an EV.
****(**)
£55,735
Competition – BMW i4, Polestar 2, BYD Seal, Tesla Model 3, Kia EV6

“The EV market is now huge and the choices impressive. That doesn’t lessen the fact that EVs are just not ready for prime time”

Looks great, drives beautifully, enough poke to make you think Ferrari, but don’t try and drive to the South of France in it.

I’ve reviewed about 40 electric cars and that opening sentence sums up many of my reports. The Ioniq 6 (Ioniq is Hyundai’s EV arm) does indeed look lovely, goes like a bomb, and has a luxurious interior, but will let you down if you stay in the fast lane for too long.

This top-of-the-range model has another futuristic feature – digital side mirrors. These replace traditional wing mirrors with cameras hidden in Star Wars-like creations where you’d normally check to see if the coast is clear for overtaking. They are designed to reduce drag, which is a huge problem for electric cars when they exceed 60 mph. With this new technology, which I’ve also experienced in the little Honda e and Audi e-trons, you now look at a screen inside the car which is unfortunately blocked by your right hand on the steering wheel.

The clever folks at Ioniq though have thought of this. When you indicate right, a little screen opens up in the dashboard to show what the camera is revealing. When you indicate left, another little screen opens up so you don’t have to look left to discover the state of the traffic before you make your move.

Brighter image require
This takes a bit of getting used to and technically works pretty well, although I think the images need to be much brighter for secure overtaking.

And of course, this being an electric car, there’s the battery-capacity overstatement, and worrying fast-lane experience. Ioniq claims a battery capacity of 322 miles (although the WLTP claim is much more). I managed an average of 270 miles from five charging attempts, a 16% shortfall. On the highway, cruising at legal speeds up and down the M23 and A27, the range depleted at an average 38% rate giving a theoretical high-speed range of 167.4 miles. That puts it at the top end of my record-of-shame databox, close to the Jaguar I-Pace and Mercedes EQA. The Tesla Model 3 still lords it over everybody else with a 239-mile rating (see below).

Hyundai says the Ioniq 6 has its lowest drag coefficient of 0.21. 

EVs are still only glorified town cars
“This delivers a clear advantage of being energy efficient and allows for an increased driving range of up to 614 km/384 miles (WLTP combined),” Hyundai said.

WLTP numbers are never explained, and my first question would be “how fast were you going?”. If you always ignore WLTP data, you won’t go wrong, in my opinion. 

The Ioniq 6’s regenerative braking worked well without being outstanding, although the measurement was a bit flaky. On one of my standard runs, the car removed 27 miles from a standard reading of 17 miles. This uphill route usually takes away just over 20 miles for an EV. On a repeat uphill run the system showed only 11 miles had been used.

This was a fantastic car to drive. Wonderful performance, smooth ride, tight steering. I loved the head-up display. The interior was high quality, although some of the plastic trim didn’t maintain the standard. The boot didn’t look very golfer-friendly, being long and narrow, but it did take my golf bag and trolley without troubling the rear seat passengers, who have plenty of room despite the fast-back looks. I never solved the Apple CarPlay conundrum via the 12.3-inch screen Naturally, there are over-the-air software updates and every known computer-aided safety device. 

What to buy – a PHEV!
I’ve listed the BMW i4, Polestar 2, BYD Seal, Tesla Model 4, and Kia EV6 as direct competitors to the Ioniq 6, but there are probably plenty more. The EV market is now huge and the choices impressive. That doesn’t lessen the fact that, in my opinion, EVs are just not ready yet for prime time.  

Only the Tesla Model 3 and Y attain barely acceptable motorway cruising range. My data may in fact be a little misleading. I’ve designed it so that you can directly compare across the whole range. But all the range predictions need to subtract 50 miles, the bare minimum any rational EV driver on a motorway would be happy to see as the range available before death. The Tesla 3 is rated at 239 miles but that really is about 190 given the above. Any cheap old £10,000 diesel could do more than twice that without any range anxiety. So, my verdict remains that EVs are still only glorified town cars. I’ve rated the Ioniq 6 ****, but that’s comparing it with other EVs. In the real world I’d rate it and the rest **. In other words, don’t buy. Buy a plug-in hybrid, and my favourite remains the Mazda MX-30 R-EV.  

Hyundai IONIQ 6