Hyundai IONIQ 5 Hatchback
New from £41,195
About the Hyundai IONIQ 5 Hatchback
- Absolutely hilarious to drive…
- There’s nothing else like it
- …but still fundamentally a spacious, comfy EV
The motoring fairy has waved its wand and granted our electric-car wish, which was for something with standout styling and a large dose of character. The blend of retro and futuristic design has won over thousands of drivers. Add in Hyundai’s generous warranty, a range of about 300 miles and choice of power and two-or four-wheel drive, and you have yourselves a winner.
How long will it take to charge?
Results based on 58.00kWh Hyundai IONIQ 5 battery
0
For a part charge (up to 0 miles)
0
For an 0% charge 0
You can charge this vehicle in 17 minutes at its fastest charging speed of 350 kW
* We have used data from the manufacturer to estimate these charging times, they are only a guide. Charging times for some speeds may not have been provided.
Is the Hyundai IONIQ 5 Hatchback a good car?
Read our expert review
Words by: Mark Nichol
"It’s hard to know where to start with the Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, so let’s go with the first and most lasting impression it makes when you drive it: pure joy. No electric car has made us laugh out loud as much as the Ioniq 5 N. It’s mind-bendingly quick; it has an idiot-proof drift mode; it has pretendy gearchanges and manic digital engine sounds and exhaust effects that warp your sense of reality; and it looks like something that Rockstar Games dreamed up for GTA 6. A standard Ioniq 5 is a brilliant car, but it’s a vast, soft, lumbering family EV, and fair to call “a challenge” as the basis of a £65,000 BMW i4 rival; it’s easy to make an electric car lightning quick in a straight line, but it’s much more difficult to give it proper visceral, heartstring-tugging driver appeal. Mission accomplished here, though. By getting both the hardware and the software right, Hyundai’s N Division has turned the Ioniq 5 into a riveting driver’s car for the Tik-Tok age."
Read the review by category
Running costs for a Hyundai Ioniq 5 N
3/5
It’ll be interesting to see how the residuals pan out, because the current used EV market suggests that a two-year-old Ioniq 5 N will be a bargain buy, and very worth waiting for. For now though, the 5 N does look expensive: £65,000 before you’ve added a sunroof and the matte blue paint option that you’ll find difficult to resist. That said, it still feels like decent value because of how good it is, and how much stuff you get as standard (there’s only one fully-loaded trim level), and in the context of an £87k-plus Porsche Taycan – a comparison that tells you everything you need to know about the N’s particular set of skills. You’ll pay a lot to insure the thing (650 horsepower will do that), and although the 84kWh battery is the biggest in any Ioniq 5, the N’s quoted 278-mile claimed range can’t quite match a standard 77kWh Ioniq 5’s 298-mile figure. Again, 650 horsepower will do that.
Reliability of a Hyundai Ioniq 5 N
4/5
In the couple of years that the Ioniq 5 has existed so far, there’s nothing to suggest that reliability is an issue. Hyundai has more than a decade of producing mass-market electric cars behind it, and the Ioniq 5’s electric hardware is shared with Kia and Genesis; lots of time, development and cash has gone into the Ioniq 5’s cutting-edge chassis. The N here gets the same five-year warranty as the standard Ioniq 5, as well as a separate eight-year, 100,000-mile warranty for the battery.
Safety for a Hyundai Ioniq 5 N
5/5
No safety system is left to the options list in the 5 N. It’s a five-star Euro NCAP rated car, and packed with safety features including emergency automatic braking, blind spot collision avoidance, live blind spot monitoring in the instrument display, adaptive cruise control… it goes on and on. Plenty of its features straddle the line between safety and convenience, like remote parking assist (using the key fob to have it self-drive out of a space), surround parking cameras, and smart cruise control with automatic stop and go. Some of the features that intrude on the driving experience, like lane-keeping assist (which physically nudges the steering wheel), can be switched off, which will be a relief to some.
How comfortable is the Hyundai Ioniq 5 N
4/5
The best hot hatches have a proper dual character: comfy, practical family hatchback one moment, entertaining high-performance car the next. The 5 N doesn’t so much have dual character as multiple personalities, but each of them is as accomplished as the other. It doesn’t wallow and soothe as much as a standard Ioniq 5, largely because of its ‘high-performance suspension’ and 21-inch wheels with supermodel-thin Pirelli tyres, but it’s about as refined as a 650-horsepower hatchback could possibly be. Having not driven it in the UK yet, it’s difficult to say how well it’ll manage our atrociously gnarly roads. That said, with the adaptable damping in its softest mode, it doesn’t feel crashy and has eight-tenths of the smoothness of a standard Ioniq 5, and all the quiet refinement. Beyond that, it’s massive inside, with an enormous about of head- and legroom, flawless driver ergonomics and a fantastic set of N-specific sports seats. They’re grippy without being vice-like. They adjust manually, though – a weird anachronism in a car this digitised.
Features of the Hyundai Ioniq 5 N
5/5
The 5 N’s most impressive trick is that it manages to layer a space shuttle's worth of software into the driving experience and keep it pure… actually, that’s the wrong word. It’s not pure at all. It’s a highly synthesised digital rendering of an analogue hot hatch. To be clear, the 5 N is a great car from a mechanical standpoint: it has a phenomenal amount of cornering grip, predictable handling, plenty of feel through the tyres, sharp and weighty steering, confident braking feel and frankly ridiculous straight-line acceleration. But on top of that, it has a dizzying array of digital emulators, tricks and sounds that make it, well... hilarious. There’s 'N Pedal', which “leverages advanced algorithms” to get the car around corners more quickly. ‘N Torque Distribution’ does basically the same thing. ‘N Road Sense’ uses cameras to detect double curve road signs and tells you to switch to Sport mode, for fun. ‘N Grin Boost’ activates the car’s maximum 650 horsepower for ten seconds (it’s usually 609), for a brutal speed burst. 'N Launch Control' gives you the best possible standing start based on the grip level of the road you’re on. ‘N Drift Optimiser’ is an idiot-proof powerslide mode: mash the accelerator, turn the wheel… you’re sliding. But the best cards up its sleeve are ‘N Active Sound’ and ‘N e-shift’, which imitate the sound of a throaty engine (or a fighter jet, if you fancy) and the behaviour of an automatic gearbox. The regeneration paddles behind the wheel become ‘gear-shifters’ and the car genuinely sounds and behaves like it has a twin-clutch transmission, in every way. An arbitrary 8000rpm limit is set, the ‘revs’ and noise rise as you accelerate, the car physically jolts and gives you a sense of more power when you shift down a gear, and it pops-and-bangs when you lift off the accelerator. Software, speakers (internal and external) and torque management are combining to achieve the effect, but together it all feels as near to driving an internal combustion car as you could hope for. You might laugh at the very idea of this fakery, but honestly, it's difficult not to be bowled over by it. It's like the first time you try a virtual reality headset: you know your brain is being tricked but if you lean into credulity and just enjoy it, it’s astonishing.
Power for a Hyundai Ioniq 5 N
5/5
You can of course drive the 5 N without all the electrical tomfoolery engaged, and in that case it feels like a relatively docile electric car; in Eco mode, the accelerator pedal is restricted for battery preservation and smooth progress. It’s obviously very quick, though. Twin electric motors give it 650 horsepower and 770Nm of torque, which is insane in a family hatchback, right? For reference, a Lamborghini Huracan Evo has 640 horsepower. It’s good for a 0-62mph time of just 3.4 seconds, albeit the car is usually running with 609 horsepower, so without the temporary N Grin Boost mode engaged, it’s going to take you 3.5 seconds to get to 62mph. Pah. It'll charge at a maximum 350kW rate, which is still beyond the capability of most rapid (DC) charging stations, but does mean it can get from 10-80% charge in 18 minutes, in theory. More importantly, 11kW on-board charging is standard, which means AC charging at a public or workplace unit will be quick.
Standard equipment
Expect the following equipment on your Hyundai IONIQ 5 Hatchback. This may vary between trim levels.
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