2023 Hyundai Ioniq 6 First Drive: Effortlessly Good, Near-Slam Dunk on Tesla
thedrive.com
thedrive.com
But overall, great to see credible Tesla alternatives coming to market. And now that Tesla is opening up the supercharger network, I think my Model 3 is likely to be my last Tesla for a while. Love the technical aspects of this car, but I'll be happy to have a more car-like car next time around.
You know what I won't be getting? A new GM that doesn't have CarPlay. WTF. How the heck did they decide that the only thing I want CarPlay for is navigation? Idiots. Hopefully they'll walk back that decision, because otherwise they seem to have some compelling designs coming in the future.
Wouldn't count on it, considering GM just announced Google will be designing their infotainment systems.
If you care about range and you think they both look cool, Ioniq 6 can really beat Model 3 on price:
Tesla Model 3 AWD Dual-Motor Long Range: $57,990, 353 mile (568 km) range
Hyundai Ioniq 6 RWD Single-Motor Long Range: $40,000, 340 mile (547 km) range
Model 3: $57,990 / 568 km = 102
Ioniq 6: $40,000 / 547 km = 73
And I didn't think Ioniq 5 looked sporty enough.
But Ioniq 6 is definitely not a bad choice.
It's the first EV cheaper than a Tesla I'd consider instead of a Tesla.
https://electrek.co/2022/08/12/tesla-stops-model-3-long-rang...
> Tesla has decided to stop taking new orders for its Model 3 Long Range, one of its most popular models, in the United States and Canada. The automaker has adopted this new business model to avoid creating delivery timelines that are super long for customers.
The waiting time for Model 3 Long Range in August 2022 was 6+ months.
Nitpick. Dual motor is AWD, not RWD.
Also, I'd wait to see real range numbers from independent testers before comparing anything. Few people (especially in the US) get anywhere near 350 miles from an LR Model 3. More realistic is maybe 250 on the first leg of a trip and 200 on subsequent legs. Very dependent on your pace.
Model 3 Long Range is AWD not RWD, range is 358 not 353, priced at $47,990 not $57,990. Most US buyers will get $7500 cash back from the Feds, bringing the price to $40,490.
There is no Ioniq 6 available for $40,000. Closest match is the SE RWD Long Range for $46,615 with 361 mile range. Not eligible for $7500 cash back.
I'm just using data found in random articles online, surely imprecise.
1. https://electrek.co/2023/03/09/2023-tesla-prices-how-much-do...
The 'legacy' manufacturers are killing it with their EV plans lately so I'd be pretty bearish for Tesla if I had skin in the game. I don't expect them to have a new model or redesign any time soon, and even if they did they tend to announce things and then launch them years later while overpromising and underdelivering.
They will absolutely catch up but I've seen a thousand articles about plans but you still can't easily buy EVs without dealer markups and waiting months.
I do really like this design though, love how bold it is.
That is one important aspect, too.
But if we're being honest, there are other things too. If you want an EV, Tesla is a pretty obvious choice, they sell by far the most. If you care about image, they're also king of that hill (we can argue how aspirational a Model 3 really ought to be, objectively, but the market sees it that way). And if you hate the traditional dealership experience, Tesla will again be appealing.
Tesla giving up the supercharger exclusivity is an interesting choice. I'll be interested to see how that works out for them.
It's called competition. Tesla needs to get used to it.
They were all a mess in one way or another. Awful software, clunky driving experience, terrible charging experience, etc.
A friend of a friend had their Ioniq 5 die within a month and it took 6 months to get it fixed because they are so low on parts and engineers.
I guess what I'm getting at is that while each of them had some really strong attributes, they all had some deal breaker for me. The Tesla isn't necessarily best at everything, but for the parts that matter to me there was nothing bad.
I think other car makers will be competitive with Tesla in another year or maybe two. But right now the package is refined in Tesla enough.
Seems par for the course to be honest. Both people I know who got rear ended in their Teslas had to wait 5+ months for repairs
The Model 3 starts in the low $40k range. Some of the luxury options you mention are at much higher price points. The vast majority of Tesla’s sales are vehicles below $60k.
Tesla has its charging network which is consistent and reliable compared to some competing networks. The Kia/Hyundai cars are the only ones that really match or beat Tesla’s charging speeds.
The combination of range, charging speed, and charger availability integrated with a smart onboard navigation system that knows the status of chargers and your estimated consumption (including speed, traffic, elevation, weather, etc.) makes for an experience that makes longer trips “just work” more often than some other vehicles.
Tesla also is on track to ship around 2m cars globally this year. Most of the competition are available in much smaller quantities, longer wait lists, and often have dealer markups due to the supply/demand disparity.
Like how close the nearest dealer or service center is to you. Or whether you live in the US, where Tesla's Supercharger network dominates, or in Europe where there is much greater coverage and competition among chargers.
Tax credits differ between states and countries as well.
And of course there are lots of reasons to like a car even if it doesn't win on specs. Style, interior features, cabin noise, physical controls versus touch controls, etc. can all matter a lot in a vehicle you are spending $50k on and drive every day.
Tesla hits the sweet spot of price, technology, good design and sales model. Speaking for myself only, I would consider very few other EV manufacturers, Hyundai is definitely peaking interest but I think for me Tesla is still edging ahead.
The dealer experience is miserable. I don't want to haggle on price, I don't want to allow a credit check just to test drive a vehicle, looking at your Genesis. There is something pleasant about going on line and having a set price and ordering.
I truly enjoy Tesla's software and car design. There are constant improvements, sometimes bad changes but overall the experience keeps getting better. Sure its a touch screen, you have to accept having a touch screen to enjoy it but compared to all other manufacturers they have a UI that makes sense for me. To me it feels like most of the decisions are practical, I don't consider my car a luxury car but more a simple EV.
Its not the cheapest EV but its also not the most expensive.
Edit: The other thing I would add is that while there are still holes, their service network beats all others. If you buy this Ioniq 6 you are still having to deal with a service network that barely touches any electric vehicles. Along with that I am sure there are many kinks Hyundai and others are trying to work out. There goal has to been to launch EV vehicles as quickly as possible to catch-up to Tesla.
Tesla has so many kinks.....
1. Wipers are using cameras and not working properly. Legacy automakers have solved this 20 years ago.
2. There are bad design decision all around and poor build quality. Examples: door seals are glued on, everyone else uses clips. Poor panel fitment.
3. Tesla makes insane cost cutting decision, removal of USS sensors, to be replaced by INFERIOR tesla vision.
4. Tesla locks you in. Dealers are independent, there is an upside to this. The dealer works for you, not for manufacturer. Tesla service center has an incentive of trying to cut cost.
5. No 3rd party parts.
6. No proper blind-spot sensors.
7. The door handles are worse than regular door handles.
8. Noise inside cabin is high, very poorly insulated.
9. The suspension in a 2022 Y I drove was BRUTAL, like a modified race car brutal. It is also a common complaint.
10. Lack of cross traffic alert and 360 camera.
11. Tow hitch requires a software unlock....like wtf.
12. FSD is a $15k scam that should not be allowed on public streets.
How is this so? The dealer works for the dealership and the same incentives to gouge you apply.
Tesla service center performing warranty work is nothing but an expense for Tesla. The tesla service center not doing the work is better for the center.
If you happen to be an engineer or just love tech, I highly recommend watching some EV teardowns (and cost analysis) on the MunroLive youtube channel. The differences are more than skin deep, and give a better picture of how Tesla manages to build so many vehicles at such high margins.
I think the competitors are getting pretty good, but Tesla still sells an order of magnitude more than them in the US, and so it will be a couple years of ramping before they're really "dunking" on Tesla. At least, around here in the midwest where I live. You can probably comparison shop a lot more easily in SF or something.
(It's possibly not the worst idea; electric cars tend to look a _bit_ weird anyway due to the lack of a proper front grille, so maybe going deliberately extremely weird is as good a way as any to handle it...)
(I think the Aptera takes the idea that an EV can be something much different to a much higher level than Hyundai does and I like what Aptera has come up with - probably will be the most efficient vehicle in production if it makes it into production)
Yeah, this particular line, and the large C pillar mask in the rear windows combined with super tiny quarter glass, just do not at all work for me. But I can see how they might for others; and I quite like the rear aspect. Still… the drag numbers stand for themselves; I give credit to any designer who can keep a sense of character or style in a car with zero compromise on drag.
361mi / 77.4kWh * 33.4g/kWh comes to 156mpge, which is significantly above Tesla's highest efficiency 132mpge Model 3 RWD. 53kWh and 240mi lower spec came out similar.
Last, 1.9kW 120V AC on board isn't bad. Do wish the review had mentioned that explicitly instead of making me dig as this is another figure-of-merit for these vehicles, and a pretty easy one to tackle & improve to be honest.
Most reviews tend to use miles / kWh.
I do really like that MPGe makes it incredibly easy to compare across gas/electric/hybrid; itvs an already known figure people already understand.
1. The amount of energy in a gallon of fuel is not constant. Where I live you can buy E85 (24kWh/gal) E15 (31kWh) E10 (32kWh) E0 (34kWh) biodiesel (37kWh) or petroleum diesel (38kWh). These numbers shift a few percent depending on temperature, altitude blend, brand, and season (summer vs winter blend)
2. The fraction is upside down! This is no big deal if you can flip it in your head to get fuel consumption, but many people cannot do this. The difference in fuel consumption between 13mpg and 15mpg is twice as large as the difference between 40mpg and 50mpg. It's just not intuitive.
With systems like diesel, it's also very apparent at the pump that the fuel costs a lot more. That diesel has 15% more energy-density is more than made up for in terms of price at the pump. And it's also a bit obvious based on the just-higher mpg that diesel vehicles have.
You're not wrong about #2, but I'm only going to give you the point if you can convince the EPA & every car manufacturer on the planet to also flip the fraction for gas vehicles too. Otherwise the advantage of speaking the common language makes it clear, and the advantage of dumbing-it-down-for-folk doesn't have enough benefit.
There's also a ton of similar problems, but we don't rewrite all our nomenclature to accomodate stupid: we let people live with the basic facts and figure it out. The difference between going 25mph and 35mph versus between 55 mph and 65 mph is far more pronounced in terms of time saved, but we still use mph or kph and haven't flipped that. Trying to attack this problem in only electric car space, only for range, while leaving everything else (like velocity) flipped: it hides & conceals to more detriment than whatever gains we make by trying to flip the fraction.
Also I think the standard kWh/100km unit is just bizarre & cruel use of metric. Way to take a sensible straightforward metric system & contort bizarrely to make even numbers. Screw this. 180kWh/1MM would be fine. Or .18kWh/km. Or 180Wh/km. But 18kWh/100km? Its such a weird contortion, mal-adjusting standard prefixes to get a useful number; it's just so ugly to me. I acknowledge that it has practical value, but it feels like such a betrayal of metric to pick "100 kWh" as your unit value.
Re: #1, I have to defend half of those blends as normal. E10 is the standard in US, and E15 was given the green light around the time oil prices got high a year or two ago. Full petroleum or B10 biodiesel blend is also, I think, the normal pump fuel but I've never owned a diesel so I can't say for sure.
The last gas car I owned, I'd fuel with E0 at the beginning of a road trip and get 650+ miles on a tank. Hybrid Toyota, I still miss that car. Driving electric I'm looking at half that range in a model S Plaid, unless I'm in a high elevation state where wind resistance is lower. 500+ mile range would be a major selling point for any EV. I guess Lucid makes one but there are no chargers in rural areas (yet) so it's a moot point.
Hell, if chargers were as common as gas stations 300 miles would be enough.
My only real complaint about my 2022 Kia Niro EV is that getting my iPhone to connect to the car can be incredibly flaky. Having a wired connection ought to greatly increase the reliability of connecting, and that's a win in my book.