2023 Kia Seltos review (inc. 0-100, autonomy & reverse test): They've finally ditched the DCT!

CarExpert

Kia has finally updated the 2023 Kia Seltos and listened to our criticisms! Kia has ditched the dual-clutch transmission and there's finally a regular torque converter transmission. There are also styling and pricing updates - so is it worth joining the wait list? Paul Maric finds out!  Hardness tester, noise and lane keeping results: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/121Auf6HGvaBqRToYcuAz94alin7Sw55SpOPECBDlnKE  More Kia content: https://www.carexpert.com.au/kia/ More Kia Seltos content: https://www.carexpert.com.au/kia/seltos  Skip Ahead: Intro: 00:00 Exterior 00:48 Interior 02:47 Infotainment 04:10 Safety Tech 05:50 Practicality 06:31 On the Road 09:08 0 - 100 km/h 13:39 Verdict 16:21  We review every new car on the market, bust car myths, cover the latest car tech and answer your burning questions.  Whether you need new car advice, purchase validation or simply love learning more about new cars and technology, we are your car experts.  Subscribe to Car Expert: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7DvMhvy3H7ntEgn9n3xQcQ?sub_confirmation=1  You'll find us dropping new video content three times a week. If you'd like to ask a question about one of our videos, simply leave us a comment. If you'd like to give us any feedback on our content, feel free to email us, or alternatively, hit us up on social media.  Finally, we want this channel to grow with your support and feedback. If there's anything you don't like or would like to see us change, we'd love to hear from you!  Follow us on social media to see what we're up to and to ask any questions!  CarExpert: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CarExpertAus Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/CarExpertAus Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carexpert.com.au  Paul Maric: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PaulMaric Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/PaulMaric Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/PaulMaric  #kia #seltos #review

Transcript

00:00 G'day, I'm Paul. The Kia Seltos, it's one of the best-selling SUVs in Australia, and

00:04 it's also in very high demand, so it has a bit of a waiting list on it. Kia has just

00:09 revealed the updated version of the Seltos, and they've changed something in this that

00:12 makes me very happy. I'll run through that later on. This is the top specification GT

00:17 line. It's priced at just under $45,000. But if that's too expensive, the entire range

00:21 kicks off at just under $30,000. This competes with things like Toyota Corolla Cross, the

00:27 Hyundai Kona, the Honda HR-V, there's a lot of those little SUVs in that segment. Today

00:32 we're going to do a detailed review of this car, so if you do want to skip ahead to other

00:35 parts of the review, you can use the time codes on the screen, or if you're on YouTube,

00:39 you can scroll down and use the chapters below, and if you haven't done so already, hit subscribe

00:43 and the bell icon so you can find out every single time my shirt matches the car we're

00:47 testing. Let's talk about the exterior. So you've got nine colours to pick from, all

00:52 but orange is going to cost you a little over $500. You've also got some two-tone options,

00:56 as well, that are a little bit more expensive. So the Seltos, what has changed? So, there

01:01 has been a style update, and I think it actually still looks really good. The Seltos has always,

01:07 to me, been one of the better lookers in the segment. You've got the IKEA logo up the top

01:11 there, this satin finish instead of chrome, which I think is great, and then black through

01:15 the centre section here with these LED portions that connect in with those headlights, radar

01:20 down the bottom, and more of that sort of non-chrome finish down the bottom of the car.

01:25 Over on this side, you have LED headlights, including LED daytime running lights. I like

01:31 that little strip down there, as well, that looks pretty cool. Whip around to the side.

01:36 Down here, you've got a set of 18-inch alloy wheels. In terms of the design, you've got

01:39 a machined finish there on the outside, piano black in the centre, a bit of wheel arch cladding.

01:44 This is an all-wheel drive, but you're probably not going to be doing any off-road driving

01:48 in it, given that it has a ground clearance of 170mm, but it's the thought that counts.

01:54 Up the top here, black finish on that wing mirror, indicator built into there, and then

01:58 no camera down the bottom there, because it does not have a 360 camera. This has the optional

02:03 black-coloured roof. I quite like that, but if you do go down the path of the two-tone,

02:07 it then removes your sunroof, so keep that in mind.

02:11 Roof rails here, privacy glass, and then round the back here, shark fin aerial LED tail lights.

02:17 Look at that, that is a very cool-looking cluster. 4X, no, not the beer, four-wheel

02:22 drive. Kia there, and then Seltos down there. It's quite an interesting design down the

02:27 bottom here, so it's a piano black finish, and then it has more of that material that

02:30 we have up the front there as well, with what looks like a rear fog light there. So, I quite

02:35 like the look of this. The styling update is really good. Kia's design lately has been

02:39 fantastic and I really like the way this looks. So, let me know what you reckon down there.

02:43 Is the change enough to convince you to step up to the Seltos? Let me know what you reckon.

02:48 We are inside the updated Seltos. This is what the Kia looks like. You've got Kia down

02:52 the bottom there. Lock, unlock, remote start, boot, blank on the back. This sits inside

03:00 your pocket. It is a proximity sensor key, and then once you're inside, you have a start

03:04 button up the top here. I quite like this update because they've gone from having just

03:08 the screen that's sat up here to having this dual setup, similar to the new Sportage, and

03:12 I think it really brings this car into the modern day and age when it comes to technology.

03:17 So it's great to see they're actually thinking about this stuff. The stuff that they haven't

03:21 changed though is all this scratchy plastic up the top here and down the sides, which

03:26 I was hoping they would do as part of this update, but they've kind of kept it all and

03:30 it would only take just a little bit of effort to make all that nice because the rest of

03:34 this looks fantastic. So, a little bit disappointing there, but that's okay. And then lashings

03:38 of piano black around the bottom there, so nothing too outrageous. In terms of your other

03:42 touch points, this is firm but soft and then soft on the door. How soft are they? We've

03:47 got our durometer, we've tested the main surfaces in this cabin. If you want to see how this

03:51 car compares to others that we've tested before, have a look at the link in the description

03:54 below. Now, build quality, a tiny bit of flex in the centre there, but for the most part

04:01 this all feels good. If you own a Seltos, what's it actually been like in terms of build

04:05 quality? Let me know down there. And then our door test, nice and solid. Okay, infotainment.

04:12 So you have two 10.25-inch displays here ahead of the driver. This one is a touchscreen and

04:17 that's your main infotainment screen. This one is not a touchscreen, but you can configure

04:21 some of the stuff here on the steering wheel. So, in terms of your features, in-built satellite

04:25 navigation and then in addition to that you have a stack of other cool little bits and

04:29 bobs here. You can actually put the car into a quiet mode, which means you're basically

04:34 only playing music up the front here, letting the kids sleep in the back. Sound mood lamp,

04:38 I don't know what that is. Ah, that's interesting. So, it allows parts of the car to light up

04:43 depending on the sound that's being played. I think it is pretty cool. Kids will have

04:48 endless fun with that. Voice memo as well, if you get any great business ideas while

04:56 you're out on the road, you can play those. You also have Kia Connect as well, which is

04:59 the service that allows you to connect to the vehicle remotely to check its status.

05:03 So, it is a nicely loaded system. On the audio front, you have AM, FM, DAB, digital radio

05:09 and that's all plumbed through an eight-speaker Bose-branded sound system. It's a good sound

05:14 system and I think that if you're into your music, you will appreciate having that. Smartphone

05:19 mirroring, you have both Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. Both of those are wired. This

05:23 is what Apple CarPlay looks like. So, full-screen integration, nice and fast as well, no dramas

05:29 there. And this is what Android Auto looks like. Again, full-screen integration with

05:32 that side menu, decent setup there as well.

05:35 Head of the driver, you have another display and you can whip through the menus there when

05:38 you change the drive mode as well. You get the menu changing, which I think is pretty

05:43 cool. And then finally, you have a head-up display there. It's projected onto this piece

05:48 of Perspex and that tends to work pretty well.

05:50 Now, safety. It is loaded to the hilt with safety tech. So, you have autonomous emergency

05:54 braking that works forwards and reverse. It detects pedestrians and cyclists as well.

05:59 You have an auto-dimming rear vision mirror, blind spot monitor built into the wing mirror.

06:04 You have a lane departure warning and a lane keeping assistant. We'll actually test that

06:07 out later to see how well that works. You have radar cruise control, front and rear

06:12 parking sensors and a reverse view camera. I'll show you what that looks like.

06:17 So the quality is okay. It's sort of not groundbreaking stuff, but you do have a couple of different

06:21 views to select from there as well. That's like a super-sized view and then a slightly

06:28 closer view as well. And then this is where your sonars appear for parking.

06:31 Now what about your practicality? In terms of connectivity, you have a 12-volt outlet

06:35 down here, a USB-A port, a USB-C port, you have a wireless phone charging pad up there.

06:40 It's nice and grippy as well. In terms of storing your phone, you can kind of pop it

06:44 anywhere. There is stacks of room in here for phone storage, which is great news. Coffee

06:48 cup fits in there fine with no D-lidding. There are just no teeth there, so when you

06:53 do put a bottle in and stuff, it's going to move around a little bit, but nothing too

06:56 bad. A bottle fits inside the door there for the small one. We'll try a big one as well.

07:01 Let's have a look. No bingo there on the big one. You have more storage here in the centre,

07:07 quite a deep pocket there. And finally, you have a glove box over here that's pretty reasonably

07:12 sized. On the comfort front, you have single-zone automatic climate control, heated and cooled

07:18 seats for the driver and front passenger, heated steering wheel as well. Seats themselves

07:22 are actually quite comfortable. They're perforated there for that air to come through, hug you

07:26 in nicely. Seat adjustment for driver and front passenger is electric, so you can go

07:30 forwards, backwards, backrest can go forwards, backwards. You can lift the front of the seat,

07:34 back of the seat. You also have lumbar adjustment too, and the driver gets two memory points.

07:39 Steering is both tilt and reach adjustable, and on our reach test, all of this is easy

07:45 to reach while you're driving.

07:47 Second row of the Seltos, there's actually a surprising amount of room here. It looks

07:52 kind of cramped, but once you're in, it's actually not too bad. So, knee room's good,

07:57 toe room's good, headroom is pretty good as well. You have one map pocket, but now you

08:02 have air vents here. You also have two USB-C slots just there, a little phone holder as

08:07 well. Centre armrest here with two cup holders, so it fits the bottle in nicely. The bottle

08:13 fits inside the door as well. You have two ISOFIX points on the outboard seats, three

08:18 top tether points as well.

08:20 What about our window test? So, it's manual up and down. Oh, so close. So, cargo space,

08:29 small SUV, is it any good? Let's have a little look. Powered tailgate, nice. So, you've got

08:36 a little over 400 litres of cargo space. It's actually not a bad sort of layout there. The

08:42 interesting thing is, under the floor here, look at this, you have a full-size spare tyre,

08:47 which I think is excellent news. I'll show you what it looks like with our bags in there.

08:51 So, laptop bag there, big suitcase there, so plenty of room in there. You can expand

08:58 the space as well, so you've got to lean in to drop the second row, but once you do, that

09:04 expands the space to just under 1,400 litres.

09:09 OK, we have hit the road in the Seltos. Now, there's two things that actually excite me

09:14 about this update. The first is the engine, so it carries over the 1.6-litre turbocharged

09:20 four-cylinder petrol, but it has more power, about 10% more, 16 kilowatts extra, now pushes

09:25 out 146 kilowatts of power and 265 newton-metres of torque, but most importantly, they have

09:32 ditched that horrible little DCT that was attached to this and it now uses an eight-speed

09:37 torque converter, and that means when you're taking off from a standing start, watch this,

09:43 it accelerates smoothly. It's not jerky, it's not silly, it is just a traditional transmission

09:50 mated to a pretty impressive engine, so from that front, it is great.

09:54 And this actually helps the engine immensely, because when you do get on the throttle, the

09:58 gearbox kicks down quick enough and then it just gets up and moves. It is a punchy little

10:03 engine and it perfectly suits this size of vehicle. And all of that's sent through an

10:06 on-demand all-wheel drive system, which means that when it detects slip on the front axle,

10:11 it sends torque to the rear and it gets you moving, so it's not a permanently engaged

10:15 four-wheel drive system. But you do have this button here, which is the four-wheel drive

10:18 lock button, you hit that and it will actually permanently send torque to all four wheels.

10:22 It does that as a 50/50 split, kind of like a locking centre differential or the more

10:28 basic version of something like that, and it should only be used on unsealed surfaces.

10:33 If you want to know why, click up here to watch a video where we explain four-wheel

10:36 drive controls in a bit more detail.

10:38 Now Kia claims a combined economy of just over 7 litres per 100 k's. We are currently

10:43 sitting on 10.1, so slightly thirsty there. I was expecting that to be a little less than

10:52 10.1, so I think that is pretty high. I think if you did a bit more highway driving, that

10:56 would probably come down a little.

10:57 Now what's ride like? Well look, in and around the city it is pretty firm, and I think it's

11:02 probably too firm for this type of thing. I know that it is the GT line, but it feels

11:06 like they've dialled a bit too much firmness into it. We can see what it's like when we

11:09 do finally hit our sine waves.

11:11 Now let's talk road noise. There is a lot of it, and it's all coming in through those

11:15 tyres. There is just a lot of, yeah, especially at highway speeds, course chip roads, it really

11:20 does get quite boomy inside this cabin, so something I think they probably need to work

11:25 on for the next generation of this car.

11:27 Okay, sine wave time. Let's jack our speed up to 130. This basically simulates overtaking

11:34 on a dodgy country road here in Australia. Given the ride is so firm, I think it should

11:39 perform okay here, so let's see how it goes. 130. Whoa, that's not very good at all. Wow,

11:49 okay. That's strange. So I think the issue here is that it is softly sprung, but quite

11:56 firmly damped, and that means in and around the city the ride is quite firm, and you do

12:00 feel a lot of that through the chassis, but then when you are driving at higher speeds

12:05 on those oscillating sections of road, it really lacks body control at the top end.

12:09 So yeah, it is a fine balance. I'd probably prefer a little less firmness in and around

12:14 the city and a bit more body control at those top ends and just nicely rounded out.

12:18 Okay, so drive modes. You've got a couple here to choose from. Eco, Normal, Sport. Let's

12:24 pop it into Sport and go for a little fang around our track. Gee, that's actually pretty

12:31 impressive. Wow, there's a lot of traction out of those tyres, and steering feel is good

12:38 as well. It's actually quite surprising how much pick-up this has. It's moving along really

12:44 nicely. Alright, let's see what it's like across the back end of our track here. Yeah,

12:51 there you go. It's really strange. It doesn't have a great deal of body roll at all. It

12:57 sticks really nicely to the road, and that all-wheel drive system is doing a really good

13:02 job of preventing this from pushing wide through corners. I genuinely was not expecting this

13:08 to be as engaging as it is. It is holding on for dear life through here. I'm able to

13:14 just lean on the throttle, extract the most that I can out of that turbocharged petrol

13:19 engine. I'll just punch it onto the back straight here and see what this feels like. It is moving!

13:26 There you go, Kia. Alright. It is moving. Okay, I wasn't expecting that from the Seltos.

13:36 That is bloody awesome. So, yeah, seriously impressive there. So, Kia doesn't have an

13:41 official 0-100 time for the Seltos, but I think it should actually be better now that

13:45 it's using a torque converter instead of a dual clutch. So, let's see how we go here.

13:50 We're in Sport mode. Dial up some revs. Alright, nice little punch in the back. We'll go all

14:05 the way to 120 as well to see our overtaking time. Nice. That was very nice. Okay, so 0-100

14:18 in 8.2 seconds, our overtaking time 80-120, 5.6 seconds. So, pretty healthy figures there

14:25 I reckon for a small SUV. And now our reverse acceleration test. Come to a stop, put that

14:32 in reverse, here we go. 75 kilometres an hour! That is unreal. Very impressive. Let's talk

14:55 visibility. So, it's easy down the front there. I can see the edges of the bonnet that taper

14:59 into the front end. The wing mirrors are nice and big with the blind spot monitor built

15:03 into them and visibility at the rear is really good as well. Hey, planning on doing any towing?

15:08 1,250 kilograms of brake towing capacity and a turning circle of just under 11 metres.

15:14 Okay, time to test our lane support systems. So, I'm going to get cruise control set to

15:20 70 kilometres an hour. There it is there. We'll turn our lane keeping assistant on.

15:27 Okay, so basically you can see there that steering wheel is green. It means that it

15:34 is holding the vehicle centred to the lane. It's doing a good job here. I'm then going

15:38 to test it in the two outer lanes as well. So, I'll jump up there to our next lane. So,

15:44 the banking of this actually simulates a much tighter turn for the car and will really put

15:48 stress on our lane centring system. So, it is riding that line very closely. It's coming

15:56 back towards the centre now but keeps drifting back towards that line. Let's see how it goes

16:02 here on our third lane. Okay, it's just triggered the steering. Okay, so basically lane one

16:16 and two it works well. Lane three is a fail there for the Seltos.

16:24 So the updated Kia Seltos, what do we reckon? It almost feels like a completely different

16:28 car. That torque converter has totally changed it and makes it a fantastic driving experience.

16:33 It's actually just really engaging and fun behind the wheel with that engine. It has

16:36 plenty of punch and it's pretty roomy inside with the latest tech. Now, I think it is probably

16:41 let down a little by the ride. The ride is too firm for my liking and then didn't have

16:45 a great deal of body control over our sine waves. But outside of that, it really is quite

16:50 a hard car to fault and I think that if you are choosing an SUV in this segment, this

16:54 really does tick all the boxes. So, let me know if you got one on order. How long are

16:58 you going to have to wait for it? Is it ages or are they coming soon? Let me know down

17:01 there. If you did enjoy this video, please make sure you like it and you share it with

17:05 your mates. And if you haven't done so already, subscribe to our channel and press the bell

17:07 icon. But until next time, drive safely.

Category

Transcript

Recommended