Kia EV4 81kWh review: 'Marmite' fastback wins points for practicality

Built in Slovakia, the EV4 hatchback is Kia’s first electric car designed specifically for Europe. It was even fine-tuned on European roads. This highlights Kia’s commitment to getting things right in Europe because, while we get the EV4 hatchback, the rest of the world gets the much less conventional-looking EV4 Fastback. Built in South Korea, it adds a sloping roofline and 300mm to the car’s back-end. Its proportions, simply, look strange and not a patch on the hatchback’s traditional, upright rear tailgate. All that said, the Fastback will also be available to UK buyers.

Driving range and prices

Like the Fastback, the EV4 hatchback uses the same E-GMP platform and is available with the same powertrains as the EV3. The entry-level hatchback gets a 58.3kWh battery delivering up to 273 miles of range. The rest of the models get the larger 81.4kWh powerpack, capable of up to 362-miles on the combined range. Stick to city driving and this increases to 467-miles..

The Kia EV4 hatchback starts at £34,695 for the entry-level Air trim, rising to £37,695 for the GT-Line — expected to be the big seller —and £43,895 for the range-topping GT-Line S. The Fastback is offered exclusively in sportier-looking GT-Line specifications and starts at close to £41,000.

Not surprisingly, I’ll concentrate on the EV4 hatchback GT-Line trim for this review.

What’s it like to drive?

If there’s one word which sums up the driving experience, it’s calm. This as close to the perfect electric family hatchback that you could possibly get. Sure it’s not what you would call exciting to drive, but boy it enjoys a super-comfortable ride equally when navigating city centre traffic or gliding along the motorway.

Acceleration is smooth, with a relaxed, rather leisurely feel to it. That said, it’s no slouch. The Kia EV4 GT-Line ‘Long Range' I drove will scamper from standstill to 62mph in 7.9secs, with the ‘Standard Range’ Air knocking 0.4s off that time. All max out at 105mph.

Across the range the EV4 uses a single electric motor, producing 201bhp and 283Nm of torque, to drive the front wheels. A combination perfectly adequate for a family car. Plus the power delivery is smooth and gentle, while always ensuring there’s plenty of power for overtaking.

But if you want more, the range will be further supplemented later with the addition of a dual-motor, all-wheel drive version. It’s also likely there will be a ‘hot’ EV4 GT: expect something around the 350bhp benchmark.

The EV4 has one-pedal driving a very clever regenerative braking system. For those not aware, one-pedal driving means the car will come to a complete halt without touching the brake pedal. Take your foot off the accelerator and the regenerative braking will not only slow the car down, but feed electricity back into the battery.

Often though, there’s only one incredibly strong setting which slows the car. Not so with the EV4 which allows the driver to choose from four strengths of regenerative braking using paddles behind the steering wheel. Select your choice, then pair it with an ‘i-Pedal’ function for one-pedal driving; easy-peasy. The combination then makes navigating city driving a cinch.

In terms of charging, the EV4 is fitted with a 400-volt set-up, as is the case with the EV3. This in turn results in a maximum charging speed of 135kW, meaning you can top-up from 10% to 80% in less than 30-minutes.

Interior

The interior essentially the same as the EV3, which is no bad thing. It’s pretty futuristic-looking, with clean, uncluttered lines. In fact the EV4’s dashboard is exactly the same. There’s a trio of screens housed within a single unit: every EV4 features a 12.3-inch digital driver’s display and a 12.3in central touchscreen, plus a separate 5.3in touchscreen for the climate controls.

The big touchscreen is your point of contact for a lot of the tech, but thankfully there’s a separate screen just for the climate controls. Plus cabin temperature and fan speed are controlled by chunky physical toggles. These are further supplemented by a row of big shortcut buttons on the dashboard, and of course there are the usual physical buttons on the steering wheel. And again, like the EV3 there’s a column-mounted gear selector, which also houses the start button.

Not surprisingly, and given that Kia wanted to make the EV4 feel more dynamic, the driver sits 40mm lower than in the SUV, plus the hatchback’s centre of gravity is 20m lower to the ground. The boffins have also tuned the suspension and steering differently to that of the EV3.

Practicality and space

There’s acres of room in the rear seats. I coaxed a six-foot colleague to set his driving position, then pop out and sit behind himself. He not only had enough rear legroom to actually stretch out, but had ample headroom and was able to position his feet under the back of the front seats. And because of the flat floor, you can comfortably seat three adults across the back seat.

Worth just highlighting, at 4430mm the EV4 hatchback is actually 120mm longer than the EV3.

Bootspace? The EV4 hatchback can swallow 435-litres of detritus; that’s significantly more than a VW Golf. And with a low loading sill, there’s also space under the boot floor to keep the charging cables stowed securely and out-of-sight. Fold the rear seats down and volume increases to 1415-litres.

A quick word on the Fastback boot. It’s actually larger, at 490-litres, but doesn’t have the same practicality due to how the wheelarches intrude into the boot space. It also has a very narrow-opening letterbox-style boot which makes it far more difficult to load larger objects.

Safety

As you would expect, the EV4 is festooned with safety kit as standard. Every model in the range gets advanced driver-assistance systems like safe exit warning and collision avoidance, and adaptive cruise control with stop-and-go function, plus a reversing camera and a number of airbags. Step up the range and you add a 360-degree surround-view camera system, extra parking sensors and blind-spot view monitoring.

Of course, a number of these features are accompanied by their own, often irritating ‘bing-bong’ alerts. Thankfully Kia has made it easy to switch a couple of them off easily. Lane-keep assist is switched off by simply depressing a button on the steering wheel, while holding the volume dial also deactivates the speed limit warning. Everything else has to be accessed via the touchscreen … which means numerous presses and sub-menus.

Warranty

As usual, the EV4 comes with Kia’s comprehensive seven-year/100,000-mile warranty.

Verdict

The EV4 is certainly different in that it targets the family hatchback sector, rather than the more popular SUV market. In the UK, the Fastback saloon sibling is unlikely to sell in numbers anywhere close the hatchback, so I’ll simply discount its relevance.

The hatchback will certainly appeal to young families looking to switch to an EV. Yes, its looks may well fall into the ‘Marmite’ category, but its combination of comfort, spaciousness and simple easy-to-drive qualities mean this is an EV which will also be easy to live with.

But perhaps its biggest problem lies elsewhere in the Kia electric range, in the form of the excellent EV3. If I had to choose, I know where my money would be going.