Kia unveiled a pair of new electric vehicle (EV) concepts today, one easy to describe and… another one.
Kia hasn’t disclosed whether either model will reach the U.S. market.
EV 3: A Subcompact SUV
The Kia EV3 Concept is an electric subcompact SUV with angular lines like those that make the brand’s 2024 EV9 3-row SUV so distinctive.
It’s not a mini EV9 or even a reduced version of the EV5 compact SUV Kia has shown off (but not put into production). Squat proportions and a forward-sloping rear window make it a bit less boxy than those models.
But it shares their almost-fractal character lines in the fenders and doors and their “star map” lighting signatures.
Inside, it gets trick rear seats like the “magic seats” once found on the Honda Fit. They fold flat like most rear seats but flip up, allowing you to carry taller items.
The concept has rear-hinged rear doors, allowing for coach-style opening. That same flourish was found in the original EV9 concept but disappeared when it became a production car.
The E3 Concept is likely to see production soon. A KBB editor saw the model in Seoul earlier this year on the condition that we would not discuss it yet, and it has changed little in the intervening months – often a sign that design decisions are close to final.
EV4: An “Entirely New Type of EV Sedan”
The EV4 Concept is.
Ah. Uh. Well. It’s… sedany? Hatchback-like?
At the same Seoul event, Kia designers referred to the EV4 as a “neo-sedan.”
The front 60% resembles a shrunken version of the sleek EV6 SUV, mounted lower to the ground like a sedan.
The rear 40% is more challenging to describe. A sloping roofline works its way down to an abrupt tail that looks as if it should all open like a hatchback. But it doesn’t. Instead, the sheet metal beneath the sloping rear window opens to reveal a long, drawer-like trunk.
Kia says it “represents a new value, approach, customer experience, and typology.”
We think this one may not see production. Kia showed off both exterior and interior models of the EV3, but only what the industry calls a “design buck” of the EV4. A design buck shows the exterior of a car but doesn’t open because there is no interior.
Instead, the company published digital renderings of a possible interior – a lower-cost approach often taken earlier in the design process when a company hasn’t committed to production.
The renderings show a clean, minimalist interior with an octagonal steering wheel and a matching stretched octagonal screen. Kia promises “new ‘Mind Modes’ feature that adjusts ambient lighting and animated ventilation patterns.”
Weird, But Kia Has Done Weird Before
We can’t be sure either design will see production or if they’ll make it to the American market. But the EV3 seems to slot naturally into the lineup as an eventual electric replacement for the Soul. Bringing the EV4 to the U.S. would require more imagination. But it took vision to design it, so we can’t rule it out.
Kia, after all, made a significant splash with the boxy Soul, a controversial design when it was new. The company still sells the Stinger (for a bit longer) even though other affordable automakers eschew the sport sedan category. And the EV9 is one of the most unusual designs recently.
So, a strange design would hardly be out of character for Kia.
