Hyundai Ioniq: 2018 Motor Trend Car of the Year Contender

We Like: How polished, high quality, and good to drive both versions are

We Don’t Like: Baked in from the start engineering compromises

The Hyundai Ioniq is available in three flavors, a gas-electric hybrid version, a plug-in hybrid (not yet available), and a fully electric car. We mostly liked the Ioniq, but no one fell in love with it. Why? Have you ever heard the old saying that a camel is a racehorse designed by committee? That applies here.

“To fit both a gas tank and an internal combustion engine meant that Hyundai had to put the battery under the rear seats, which means the electric version doesn’t have as much range as it could have, and the hybrid/PHEV versions have to have structural accommodations for the bigger, heavier battery that they don’t have,” Christian Seabaugh said. Long story short, the Prius Prime is better as a hybrid, and the Tesla Model 3 is a better electric car.

So what did we like? Basically everything else. Angus MacKenzie praised Hyundai’s design restraint. “Hyundai is to be commended for not making its hybrid—and its battery electric sibling—look weird because … Prius,” he said. “Both are cleanly and conventionally styled, and we’ll take that all day long.” The looks were described as “freakishly vanilla” by one judge, though.

Moving on. “These drove surprisingly well, had nimble steering, not too much body roll on the winding road, but the tires are squealers,” Alisa Priddle said. “I love the one-pedal driving, and, man, is this car quiet. It rides so well, too.” Perhaps the home-field advantage helped its ride and high-speed stability, Chris Walton noted, as the Ioniq was tuned on the same roads as our COTY evaluations.

	2017 Hyundai Ioniq Electric	2017 Hyundai Ioniq Hybrid
BASE PRICE	$30,385	$23,085
PRICE AS TESTED	$36,835	$25,960
VEHICLE LAYOUT	Front-engine, FWD, 5-pass, 4-door hatchback	Front-engine, FWD, 5-pass, 4-door sedan
ENGINE	Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor	1.6L DOHC 16-valve I-4
TRANSMISSION	1-speed automatic	6-speed twin-clutch auto
CURB WEIGHT (F/R DIST)	3,280 lb (49/51%)	3,085 lb (61/39%)
WHEELBASE	106.3 in	106.3 in
LENGTH x WIDTH x HEIGHT	176.0 x 71.7 x 57.1 in	176.0 x 71.7 x 56.9 in
0-60 MPH	8.7 sec	8.8 sec
QUARTER MILE	16.8 sec @ 83.8 mph	16.7 sec @ 83.0 mph
BRAKING, 60-0 MPH	129 ft	133 ft
LATERAL ACCELERATION	0.77 g (avg)	0.77 g (avg)
MT FIGURE EIGHT	28.2 sec @ 0.59 g (avg)	28.4 sec @ 0.58 g (avg)
EPA CITY/HWY/COMB FUEL ECON	150/122/136 MPGe	55/54/55 mpg
ENERGY CONS, CITY/HWY	22/28 kW-hrs/100 miles	61/62 kW-hrs/100 miles
CO2 EMISSIONS, COMB	0.00 lb/mile	0.36 lb/mile

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