Should You Lean Toward Hyundai or Kia When Choosing Your Next Ride?

Very few automotive brands are as closely related in today’s market as Hyundai and Kia. These two brands are corporate cousins under the Hyundai Automotive Group.

If all thumbs are fingers but not all fingers are thumbs, does that mean that all Kia models are actually Hyundai vehicles? No, not necessarily. These two South Korean brands work to ensure they don’t offer exactly the same products with different badges. We saw what happens with this takes place with some of the brands offered in the past. If you’re considering similar models from these two brands, which one should you choose to drive?

Will You Find Strong Differences in Pricing?

Strangely, the Hyundai Group doesn’t put one of these brands in a class above the other. Instead, each brand leans on a personality difference that allows them to be unique compared to the other. With this in mind, pricing is pretty much the same and consistent for these two brands. You’ll find the Kia Forte, Rio, and Soul are affordable and fit in the $20,000 range. When you turn your attention to Hyundai, the Accent, Elantra, and Venue also fit into this same price range, which means you aren’t finding any real distinction in the pricing of these two brands.

Which Brand Offers a Better Safety Package?

Both the Kia and Hyundai brands have strong reputations for safety and impressive crash test scores from both the NHTSA and IIHS. Most of the vehicles under these two brands have a generous list of advanced driver assistance systems to offer plenty of safety. The scores came out pretty close to each other, but the Hyundai brand edges out its corporate cousin in terms of safety with a score of 9.6 out of ten compared to 9.2 for Kia.

Which Brand Offers Better Overall Performance?

This particular comparison brings a strong lean toward the Kia brand. The sporty Stinger is an excellent high-performance luxury car that is a lot of fun to drive. Hyundai ended production of the Veloster N, which was the only real performance vehicle from this brand. If you consider performance as a measure of sportiness, the Kia brand stands out with the Stinger and the new K5 that replaced the Optima. This is one area where you expect Kia to be the leader. Hyundai is not known for offering performance-oriented vehicles.

Does One Brand Offer Better Interior Quality than the Other?

Hyundai has a few models in the lineup that drag down the performance quality of the brand. These cars offer interior elements that are much lower than expected. Only two vehicles in the entire Hyundai Lineup offer interior qualities that make them attractive to most buyers. Kia brings a more dynamic package of interior features. It helps that Kia has recently added the Seltos and Carnival to the mix, which both add more high-quality materials in the cabin area. As the Hyundai lineup is refreshed, we can expect more high-quality interior elements that should resemble the Palisade.

Will You Find Better Fuel Economy Numbers in One of These Brands?

You might think the Hyundai and Kia lineups are identical when it comes to fuel economy, but that’s not the case. The Hyundai Ioniq is a serious differentiator. While this name was offered as three models it topped the charts for fuel mileage. Now that we have the Ioniq 5 and Kona Electric, we see a pair of all-electric models from the Hyundai brand. This brand also has several hybrids, including the Santa Fe PHEV, Tucson PHEV, and Ioniq PHEV.

Turning to Kia, we have the EV6 and Niro EV as the two all-electric models. Unfortunately, Kia doesn’t have as many plug-in hybrids, with only the Niro PHEV and Sorento PHEV offered.

Which Brand has a Better Subcompact Car?

Here we see the Hyundai Accent going up against the Kia Rio in this car class. These two corporate cousins fill a class that is small and dwindling, but these two soldier on with quality and desirable features. The Accent is the more impressive of the two. This car has an intuitive infotainment system, a smooth ride, and an impressive reliability score. This car ranks at the top of the subcompact car market, while the Rio doesn’t reach similar levels of reliability in this class.

Turning to the Compact Cars: Which Brand is Better?

When you’re looking at compact cars from these two brands, the Kia Forte is the car you want to drive. This model goes up against the Hyundai Elantra, but the Elantra brings a higher starting price than the Forte while offering lower-quality interior materials. It’s not even close between these two cars; you’ll be glad to drive the Kia Forte. Of course, if we add the Elantra Hybrid to the mix, you’ll find higher scores than both the standard Forte and Elantra.

Does One Brand Offer Something the Other Doesn’t?

Kia offers a minivan called the Carnival, while Hyundai does not offer a minivan at all. The Kia Carnival is relatively new, and it packages some amazing features to make it one of the best options, especially if you want a minivan with some style, upscale interior elements, spacious seats, and tons of cargo capacity. The Carnival offers easy deriving manners and a strong, fuel-efficient V6 engine to give you the power and drive you want when it’s time to take your family out on the road for an adventure away from home.

Of course, we can also look to another part of the market and see something offered by Hyundai that Kia doesn’t have in the mix. The Hyundai Santa Cruz is a compact pickup truck which is new to the market. This small and active truck shares a platform with the Hyundai Tucson and gives us a small truck that’s both efficient and capable. You can tow up to 5,000 pounds with this pickup, and it’s small enough to park just about anywhere you want to go. The Santa Cruz has a high-end interior to make it a wonderful vehicle for you to enjoy plenty of truck stuff.

When comparing these two South Korean automotive brands, it’s hard to truly find a brand that stands out above the other. Both offer plenty of great ways to engage drivers and give them what they desire. Which brand is right for you?