2024 Hyundai Kona Electric

Lemon stay away

Friday, October 25, 2024

The car came with a defective alternator that needed replacement and now a speed limiter randomly and dangerously slows down the car. It can’t be duplicated by their service department and even though I have photographic evidence, Hyundai will not buy back this defective vehicle-I am hoping my state’s lemon law will force them to do so.

Great car for a great price

Friday, January 12, 2024

I have the Limited trim of the 2024 Kona Electric and I have to say I find this car to be pretty good. The only con I would have would be the charging times of course, but I have found it to be not a big deal, due to me charging at work. The ride is smooth and the features on the inside are very good. If you are looking at the 2024 Kona Electric definitely go for the Limited trim because the extra features are well worth the extra $3k. I'll post another review after a couple of months on the road with it.

Overpriced and underwhelming but cute?

Monday, July 15, 2024

I signed a lease on a 2024 Kona EV SE about a month ago, and I've been kicking myself ever since. The dealer didn't mention it until I was moving my stuff over from my old car, but there's no spare - not even a donut. Nor did they give me a cable to plug it in at home with. That's to save weight, apparently. Which I kind of get, considering how abysmally inefficient this car has been. Charged up to the 80% they recommend, you're getting an estimated 190 miles. I keep the car in eco mode, max regenerative braking, and the climate controls set to the less powerful mode for efficiency. I have never once gotten anywhere CLOSE to the range they've set. The car has less than 1k miles on it and I've charged from 20% up to 80-90% at least 8 or 9 times, now. I will never understand why the cargo net is such a ridiculous design, holding a very small number of items down to the floor instead of a way to keep a normal amount of items that human beings might want to have in the back of their car - say, I don't know.. maybe groceries? - from falling out the back when the hatch is opened. But, I guess that space that still exists FOR a spare tire could be a fun place to hide things. My roommate has one of the IONIQ vehicles, and it kind of irks me to see the extent to which the cheaper trim models even cheap out on just the LOOK of the software. I've never seen a brand so aggressively nickel and dime people in just the most ridiculous ways. I gave up the gas powered Kona because it was absolutely awful to take on road trips, struggling even with a single passenger to get through the mountains. This ridiculous golf cart on steroids wouldn't even get you on a trip from LA to Phoenix. You'd probably have to take two days to make the drive by the time you charged every 150 miles and waited 45 minutes just to get THAT. Yeah, it's insanely slow at charging. Multiple different EVGo high speed charging stations and I've never once seen it go over 48 kW during charging. And I know it's not necessarily a huge deal, but I can't describe how much I hate the paddle gear shifter thing. I've almost backed into something TWICE now because it's such a jarring and unintuitive way of trying to change gears. WHY was this necessary? Who asked for this? I don't think I've ever hated a car as much as I do this Kona.