The Kia EV9 electric car is Kia's newest, most generation-defining electric car! Now that I have had the chance to properly test drive one for a week — specifically the Kia EV9 GT-Line AWD trim — I can better tell you it’s unlike any other SUV I’ve driven or seen before, made much better by all the tech it’s packing to make my driving safer and more relaxing. With its angular cuts, flashy looking LED projector lights, and stylish rims, it screams concept everywhere you look — something that rarely translates to a production model.
In this review, I go through the main Kia EV9 features and functions while taking it on an efficiency test to better gauge its electric vehicle performance. Is this one if the best electric cars?
In this review, I go through the main Kia EV9 features and functions while taking it on an efficiency test to better gauge its electric vehicle performance. Is this one if the best electric cars?
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TechTranscript
00:00This is the Kia EV9, 2024 models, three-row style SUV, all-electric. It looks
00:07like a concept car, but here it is. You could buy it right now. I get to test
00:10drive it. I'm really excited about that, so let's jump in. I've got the Kia EV9
00:18for just about a week, so I'm gonna spend the weekend getting used to all the
00:22bells and whistles that come with this EV. Oh look, shoot! Before performing an
00:26efficiency test while driving to Sandy Hook in New Jersey, is it worth buying as
00:31your next car? I've been driving the Kia EV9 over the weekend, and I think the
00:35first thing that really stand out is just the design. It's that futuristic concept.
00:40You actually see it. It turns heads. It's different. You have those angular cutouts,
00:44aerodynamic design, and the color. It really pops. You have this almost blue, very
00:51shimmery tone, and that kind of goes with the futuristic look of the design. The
00:55starting MSRP for the 2024 EV9 is $55,000. However, the model I'm driving is
01:01the GT-Line all-wheel drive and will run that price up to $74,000. Now for that,
01:06you get second-row captain's chairs like the passenger and driver seats, dual
01:10sunroofs, blind spot monitors, and more drive assist features, including a head-up
01:16display in the windshield. For its price range, you get some really cool features
01:21that are usually found in luxury cars. For example, the heads-up display. You have
01:26the 360-degree parking system with the cameras. You have all the driver assist
01:32modes, and a really nice sound system as well. The driver is really smooth. For a big
01:39size SUV, it's pretty responsive. The regenerative braking system, it was kind of
01:44tight at the beginning when I first started driving down New York. So every time you let go,
01:48you feel like it's slowing down already. It's kind of jarring, especially when the
01:52regen brakes are a little bit abrupt. While I was driving it, I mostly had it on Eco mode.
01:58That's going to save a lot of your power, so it's going to give you a longer range. But I noticed
02:03that if I switch to something like sports mode, that's when you get a lot more power,
02:07more responsiveness, not only in the brakes, but also in the acceleration. So you tap it lightly,
02:12and you feel it. So as far as sound goes, it's pretty quiet. Obviously, it's an EV, but much like
02:19other EVs, Teslas, they have that sort of like hum to it. So as I'm driving, you'll hear it. That's
02:25probably the only thing. It's not as loud as some other EVs I tested, like the Ioniq 6. So it's a
02:30little bit more subdued, but it is still noticeable. 331. That's something I'm not going to miss. The gas
02:37prices. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. Uh-oh. Look at that. 20%. I have a range of 58 miles. So obviously,
02:46it tells you that and shows you where you could actually find the nearest charging station. So
02:51let's do this. Yeah, there you go. Okay. Keep your eyes peeled for an EV charging station, because it
02:59should be somewhere here. Left here. I need EV chargers. Where are your EV chargers? EV chargers.
03:09Okay. There's EV geochargers. Yeah. Start. It's totally not in this class. Okay. So let's go back. I don't
03:17notice this on CarPlay, but when I use Android Auto and use navigation with Google Maps, I could get
03:24the turn-by-turn directions in the heads-up display, which is nice because obviously I don't want to look
03:28down to the console here to find out where I'm going. But with CarPlay, unfortunately, it doesn't
03:33seem to be compatible with it. So I don't see any of that. Oh, the promised land. EV go. There we go.
03:43We made it. 20% left. Okay. So this is going to be interesting. I'm going to back up. I'm going to
03:51use the backup camera here, which using the backup cameras kind of guides you, which is great. You
03:56could see if I'm going to hit something, which it looks like I will. So I'm going to move forward,
04:02line it up, and you could see just like that. Get it nice and straight. It's telling me go this way,
04:13this way. I'm here at the charging station. So now I got to pay to charge the EV9. So I'm using
04:23this app called ChargePoint. I signed up. The nice thing about the app, it actually shows you what are
04:28the rates. So for example, today it is Tuesday. We're in the middle afternoon, 2 o'clock. So we're
04:33going to get a charge rate of 64 cents per kilowatt hour. That's the highest versus in the morning.
04:40From 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. It looks like it's less at 59 cents. And then the cheapest is going to be
04:45usually from midnight till seven o'clock. That's pretty much universal from what I've been seeing
04:49so far.
04:50And it was just simple like that. It shows us remaining time, 34 minutes, like a phone. The last,
05:02like after 50%, it just takes forever. It takes a longer time for it to charge. It's best to always
05:07charge your EV when it's a pretty low battery. But if you're around 20%, you charge it for 30 minutes,
05:13you can get a huge gain. Whereas if I charge it at around 60% and for the same amount of period,
05:19I imagine it probably still won't get past 80%. So here's the main dashboard of the EV9. And once
05:26you pair your phone, you got to go through the Bluetooth settings, pair your phone. Once you do
05:31that, it'll automatically know if it's an iPhone or Android. And then for an Android, right now I've
05:35connected with the Pixel 8 Pro. So I just tap on Android Auto. And basically, it gives me nearly
05:41everything that's on my Android phone here in the dashboard. So you have apps, most of your apps,
05:48you can customize the apps on your phone. Obviously, they want to make sure that you're
05:52not distracted. So as far as texting, it'll be disabled as you're moving. And I like how you have
05:57this two panel interface where you have, you know, one side, for example, navigation, and the other
06:02side, the other app. The other thing I like about the EV9 is that there's a lot of customization.
06:07So as far as the interior space, the lights, you could change all that up. So here, if I go to
06:12vehicle, I go to lights. At night, there's the light patterns. They have a really nice effect. The
06:22cool thing is that you could select the different patterns that you like. So if you want something
06:26that has a different type of design, you could do that. It's the small touches that make this car
06:32really personable. It's done charging at 80%. It's showing us 289 miles range. So now what we're
06:40going to do here is we're going to drive down to the beach, see how far it gets, and also what the
06:44percentage is once we arrive there.
06:49So while I'm driving here, I want to show you guys lane assist. It's one of the features here with
06:53EV9. So when you have it enabled, they'll actually be able to detect the lane you're in and keep you in
06:59that lane. So technically, it's going to move the steering wheel. Even if the road starts to bend,
07:05it'll actually start moving, rotating. I kind of like it, but I could see how some people who are
07:10not used to it, especially first timers, it can feel a little bit jarring because sometimes there
07:16are moments where you feel the steering wheel kind of moving abruptly. So you have this tendency of
07:21actually trying to take control back of the wheel. Let's see here. Here's another really cool feature
07:29here. You have the lane change cameras. So as you're switching lanes, it'll show you a preview of
07:36your blind spot. That's a feature you're not going to see in many cars. I can still rely on the side
07:42mirror here for that, but you have the convenience of seeing your blind spot directly in the dash.
07:48Now we're hitting congestion here and a feature that I think is useful with EVs, especially the EV9
07:54here is dynamic cruise control with lane assist. So right now, as you can see, the car is accelerating
08:00and also applying a brake. So I set the cruise control for 29 miles per hour. There's a distance
08:06I could set to between the next car in front of me. I have it at three. So it's a little bit farther away
08:11versus one, which would be very close to the car. So the nice thing about this assist feature is that
08:17it'll do everything for you. Not only move the steering wheel, it'll apply the brake and also the
08:23acceleration. It's good. But again, it's more of an assistance. It's not full automation because it lacks our
08:30perception because I could tell already in the front way down there. It's already okay. So here's for example,
08:35what's it going to do? What's it going to do? Good. You saw the screen here. It knew that a vehicle on the right lane
08:42was coming into my lane and applied the brake. So that's a really good safety feature right there.
08:49Okay. Now that we're good. The other thing I want to point out is the heads up display. In the
08:55windshield, I can see pretty much what I see down here in the console. So it has my speed limit.
09:01It tells me also what speed limit is of the road I'm in, the driver assist features on, and even the
09:08navigation, which is great. So I don't have to move my eyes, you know, towards the middle here where I
09:13have the main navigation system. I could just lean on that for everything. And it's not as distracting.
09:19We're 17 miles in after 30 minutes. And given the stop and go nature of the traffic and the congestion,
09:25and we also have the air conditioner running, it's only dropped 5%. So that's pretty impressive in my book.
09:38So we're about to head into Sandy Hook Beach. It's the northernmost beach in New Jersey.
09:50Okay. We finally arrived at our destination here at Sandy Hook. And with the EV9, we traveled 32.3 miles,
10:06and we're down to 71%. So that's 9% down since we first started. Kind of equates to roughly around
10:133.5 miles per 1%, which isn't too bad. And as we test out more EVs on the same route, I'll be
10:20interested to see the different efficiencies and how they compare to the EV9. I don't think there's
10:25a better EV that packs as much utility as the EV9. There's plenty of safety, comfort, and assistant
10:31features. Plus, it's certain to draw attention with its slick design that's unlike anything else on the
10:36road. I know it's pricey, but worth it if you have the money to spend.
10:43And that's it with the Kia EV9. I definitely enjoyed driving this. A lot of cool features,
10:47a lot of cool tech inside from the way it looks, the way it drives, and I gotta stress those safety
10:53features. Definitely make it a satisfying experience. What do you guys think? Let me know in the comments
10:58below. Don't forget to follow us on social at Tom's Guide. I'm John B., and I'll see you in my next video.