The world of three-row electric crossovers is about to get a bit bigger. Just a few short months after its debut, the Hyundai Ioniq 9 is about to roll out of Hyundai’s Georgia-based EV plant and into driveways across America, and we now know how much it’s going to cost.
It all kicks off with the Ioniq 9 S, featuring the same 110.3 kWh battery pack and 800-volt architecture as all other trims and ringing in at $60,555 including freight. This base model offers sensible output, with a single rear-mounted motor kicking out 215 horsepower. Alright, so the S trim won’t be a speed demon, but Hyundai claims it offers 335 miles of EPA range, the most of any Ioniq 9. You get a good amount of kit as standard too, including 19-inch wheels, heated cloth front seats, seven USB-C ports, a leather-wrapped steering wheel, a power liftgate, and dual 12.3-inch screens.
If you want all-wheel-drive, you’ll be stepping up to the $64,365 Ioniq 9 SE AWD, which trades 15 miles of range for a second electric drive unit and a boost in output to 320 horsepower. While equipment changes over the S are modest, the most notable of which is the addition of a power passenger seat, this is your entry-point to an all-wheel-drive Ioniq 9.
Then again, if you’re paying these sort of prices, you probably want more toys, and the $67,920 Ioniq 9 SEL is the next rung of the ladder. It gets the same powertrain as the SE AWD, but swaps cloth upholstery for synthetic leather, gives you the comfort of a heated steering wheel and ventilated front seats, adds heated power-folding mirrors, throws in a 360-degree camera system, and rocks a set of 20-inch wheels, among other items. Best of all, range doesn’t take a hit over the Ioniq 9 SE, meaning this could well be the pick of the range.
Are you ready for the next big leap? For those who find themselves habitually late, the Hyundai Ioniq 9 AWD Performance Limited turns the wick up to 422 horsepower and might scoot to 60 mph in roughly the same amount of time it takes to say its full name. Range takes a slight hit, down from 320 miles in the SEL to 311 miles, but that’s the price of power. Alright, the actual price of power is $72,850, but you do get more than just extra thrust. We’re talking 21-inch wheels, a panoramic sunroof, heated and ventilated captain’s chairs with leg rests in the second row, a Bose sound system, a vehicle-to-load power outlet in the cargo area, and the ability to use your phone as a key.
If that isn’t fancy enough for you, the $76,590 Ioniq 9 AWD Performance Calligraphy trim ought to do the trick. It might be focused on appearance with its new fascias and body-color arches, but it puts the cherry on top with a head up display, two-tone upholstery, a digital rearview mirror, and the ability to park it from the key fob for egregious instances of flexing. It’s one hell of a party trick. Or go all the way up the range, adding the design pack for a matte-painted $78,090 Ioniq 9 with turbine wheels.
At the high end of the range, it’s hard not to notice how close the Ioniq 9 comes to the pricing of the $79,090 Cadillac Vistiq. Granted, the Cadillac doesn’t have as many toys as a loaded Ioniq 9, nor does it have Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, but it does come with serious presence and an enormous 615 horsepower. At the same time, $77,900 gets you into a Rivian R1S, which only has 270 miles of range to the top-spec Hyundai’s 311 but is a more off-road-oriented machine.
Looking further down the range, that $67,920 SEL trim rings up at $2,525 more than a mechanically similar all-wheel-drive Kia EV9 Wind, and while the Kia only offers 280 miles of range to the Hyundai’s 320, it adds dual sunroofs and is an impressive vehicle in its own right. Still, that’s a low enough price delta that those three-row E-GMP twins will be really going at each other. We’ve driven the EV9, and we can’t wait to get some seat time in the Ioniq 9 to see how it stacks up. Oh, and if you already have an order in on an Ioniq 9, you probably won’t have to wait long. The first examples will be arriving in showrooms before the middle of the month.
Top graphic credit: Hyundai
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The wheel arches look like they’re waiting for mascara.
PS. What is a nonce, and why is mine invalid?
I can’t think of the time I’ve said this about a modern vehicle. The power specs seem low. Under 300 hp for a larger SUV with a big battery seems lower than I would expect.
And strangely, I’m not unhappy about this. I think the right power level for this vehicle is 300-350 hp and the AWD version is in this realm. I’m just shocked that 400+ isn’t standard and the optional powertrain is over 600. Maybe, we are finally getting to the realm where people are realizing that being able to slam your head so hard into the headrest that you give yourself a concussion isn’t always a need and the having longer range, lower operating or lower purchase price to have something that is merely adequate in power is enough.
I too am absolutely OK with the 3 ton 9-seater brick with blind spots the size of Delaware not having the acceleration of a high-end sports car.
There’s always something weird on Hyundai designs where if you can get past that, they’re great – here it’s obviously the wheel arches, all seventeen of them.
Yes, it’s good looking enough until you start looking at the details. I really wish they’d dial it back just a notch or two.
I’m usually a Hyundai styling apologist, but I would take the Kia in this case.
Last weekend I saw an EV9 in the wild at its natural habitat (youth soccer tournament). It made me do a double take because of it’s size and sleekness.
I used to appreciate that Hyundai’s weird styling existed, even if it wasn’t always my favorite. However, recently they’ve been so offensively bad that I’m dismayed by the fact that I’m going to have to look at thousands of these over the next few years. I was already pissed about the hideous Santa Fe rear end, and now they do this to me?!
There’s not a single angle where you can’t see something that makes you go “WTF?” on this thing.
From the land of SSangyong… whaddaya expect?
This category is not for me, but I will say, if you’re going to do a rear sloping roofline/ fast back type thingy, this is the solution. It seems to retain reasonable rearward visibility, a good cargo opening and useful shape and not lose rear headroom. I am sick of all the futzy D pillar stylings these days and this in no exception.
I haven’t shopped this segment, but it does seem to me like this is really competitively priced. Sad to have to say that about something so expensive.
It’s 8 o’clock on a Friday morn, I open my PC to work
And look, it’s a new car I’ve never seen, and now I just feel like a jerk
They said “Clad up the body with piano black!
Clad up that body with junk
‘Cause we’re all in the mood for a Subaru!”
Reflections and fingerprints suck
That profile looks vaguely familiar –
Isuzu Axiom – Is that you?
Im getting hints of chrysler aspen
I don’t know!
I think it looks great!
Especially the D pillar!
Unlike the Ioniq 6 which I just cannot get my head around.
Is that piano black plastic cladding around the wheel arches?
Yes – Just like the piano black grille surround on my new E Class loaner….
Can you imagine paying $60K for a car and having manual seat adjustments?
Give it sliding doors and make it a minivan you cowards.
I have two boxes with 50a wiring and blank plates just waiting.
Ignoring all styling discussion, but the nearly negligible range hit for both the standard and performance AWD is a big deal here. In the EV9 which admittedly has a smaller battery pack, the AWD option costs at minimum 34 miles of range, or around 10%, and the GT line costs an additional 10 miles. Here the highest to lowest range delta is around 25 miles, rather than 44, and most importantly over 300, which is the arbitrary number that seems to get butts into seats.
It doesn’t seem that the EV 3-Row family hauler segment is particularly large compared to the ICE/Hybrid/PHEV segment, I suspect this will sell very well relative to its competitors and even the EV9.
I kinda like the design, it’s giving off a lot of wagon vibes, plus a little Isuzu Axiom. For Hyundai’s recent offerings, it’s surprisingly restrained, but that D pillar needs help.
This is my target market, but it’s going to take a lot to get me out of a 10-year-old Odyssey that’s paid off and basically doesn’t depreciate. $65k (comparably equipped) buys a lot of fuel.
“That’s not the point!” is the obvious counter to that, but it’s not getting me off the couch. I’m still hoping it does well, the GA-AL “Kiundai Corridor” is killing it these days and I’m happy for they jobs they’re bringing to those areas. I’ve spent a lot of time in both places in the past 30 years and the economic and industrial turnaround has been amazing.
Clean up those gawd-awful wheel wells and this thing would look good.
Those wheel wells *inserts what the hell is even that* gif. Over all this thing is ugly but those wheel wells make it even worse.
you dont want a small piece of body colored trim inside your piano black cladding?
Too bad this thing hit every single branch, twice, as it fell from the ugly tree. I didn’t think they could make something uglier than the Kona with their current design language, yet somehow they did. I was stuck behind a pre-production Ioniq 9 for 35 miles a year ago, and it was just as ugly then, even covered in a camo wrap. How this and the Kona occupy the same showroom as the Santa Fe and Ioniq 5 just blows my mind.
Do you mean Santa Cruz? Because the Santa Fe is the only vehicle on the road with an uglier ass than this. 😛
Why the heck is Hyundai capable of this, but the VW’s ID Buzz is more expensive for less range.
The ID Buzz isn’t frumpy to look at?
The ID Buzz looks great. Unfortunately it’s ridiculously expensive for what it is and forces you to deal with arguably the worst infotainment technology of the 21st century.
It’s also the “worst” EV in that it’s based on the ID4 platform with all those downsides. I.e. no heat pump, the largest range loss in cold weather, poor range even in good wather, and just flat out mediocre performance. It’s a whole lot of low to mid at best metrics in a cool package for a stupidly high price. Bad bad bad deal all around.
They dumped all of their stats into charisma and hoped for the best
I mean it’s really all VW has left. Their ICE cars are unreliable and not competitive. Their EVs are overly complex/frustrating to interact with and similar less than competitive. Most of their lineup has also been victimized by German anti-design. In their quest to design cars that offend no body they’ve gone and made cars that excite no body.
But VW still has its history. Everyone knows what the OG vans are, everyone knows what Beetles are even though they haven’t been produced for many years, many folks see the letters GTI and instantly think plaid seats, etc. I can’t blame them for leaning into that as hard as they can, I just wonder if it’s too little too late.
I’m not sure if it’s too late but I will say that it’s too little. The top trim of all of their vehicles should be an engine upgrade and the suspension to match and call it “GTI” Sure, it’s not for everybody but at least it’s a personality
I have no idea why they’re not milking that name for all it’s worth. I mentioned this on the Tiguan article. Those 3 letters are iconic and they should adorn everything that’s faster than the base cars. It’s up there with AMG, M, etc.
I think the Canadian Buzzes get heatpumps.
Looking good, shouldn’t cost so much.
Mazda figured it out, how come no one else can?
its also much larger than people give it credit for. its massive on the road
Is it just me or does this have strong Isuzu Axiom vibes?
I feel like we just talked about an Axiom…….or is it just me?
You both beat me to it, but yeah, we did just talk Axiom in Mercedes’ article the other day. I haven’t seen this vertical D-pillar treatment on a US market car since then.
I was going to ask “who the hell is buying these things” but remembered I see EV9s quite often here in DC. As long as they can keep the lease deals flowing these big EV crossover things are a great value for family transportation, especially when a reasonably equipped Pilot/Odyssey, Sienna/Highlander, etc. is a $50,000+ proposition now.
I just checked and it looks like the EV9s are going for $399-449 a month. That’s almost certainly less than a payment on a comparable ICE hauler. If you can make an EV work for family duty (we can’t since my wife’s family is 300ish miles away by car) I say go for it…especially because orange man and his cronies are going to annihilate EV subsidies any minute now.
Will Elmo let him? Tesla’s virtue signaler sales are already gone, and the Chinese government mandated sales are now being directed to domestic producers. If the value buyer sales go too, there isn’t going to be a lot of bread left at the Tesla table.
What I find weird is I live in minivan/SUV central, and a place where the Korean brands are super popular (and where they’re built), but the EV models are nowhere to be found.
I’m 95% sure it’s a supply issue, since newer EVs are almost always allocated to the top 10 MSAs and/or places where sales are more of a sure thing. Why let an EV sit on the lot for even a week or two if you can pre-sell it? Makes sense, but it also hurts the larger mission of pushing EV adoption to “first timers” as well as to the people where an EV makes the most sense (ie, garages with home charging, lots of suburban driving and commutes, etc)
Im in DC, which is a gold mine for manufacturers. There’s a lot of wealth around here, there are a lot of EV curious folks, and there are a lot of car buyers in general. If there’s a specific car you want to get your hands on this is a pretty decent area to look, not to mention New York and Philly are day trippable if there something you REALLY want.
I see EV9s all over the place and it makes sense. Family haulers are expensive and often gas guzzlers. If you don’t mind leasing an EV9 is a great value and uses no gas. I get why people want them, and I bet people will want this too.
Yep, DC has always been one of the less-appreciated “early adopter” markets in the US. My dad grew up in the district and my gramps was a lawyer and lobbyist there in the 50s-60s. They drove crazy new cars like the VW Beetle that most people derided as just a crappy little Hitler Car at the time. But the post-war international influence in the city can’t be understated, everything from food to language to cars. Because of a revolving door of diplomats and their families (which was kind of a new thing for the US) it brought a ton of new exposure to the city and beyond.
To this day, I’m convinced VW sells half their US vehicles within 100 miles of DC. You don’t see concentrations like that in most of the country. My brother lives outside Baltimore and has a choice of about 5 local specialist mechanics for VW alone. That definitely takes the edge off the fact that your VW will spend half its life in the shop 🙂
A ROUND STEERING WHEEL!
Everyone rejoice!
Agreed, with a bitter note of how sad it is we gotta celebrate stuff like this.
It’s only there so everyone over 35 can still feel comfortable with it. They’ll go with a rhombus at the mid-cycle refresh.
I’m holding out for a steering wheel shaped like a 4d tesseract. That’s how to engage the driver!
How dare you attack my specific age range!
If they want the only true ergonomic control, they need an Xbox controller.
Only if it’s the OG “Duke” controller from original Xbox. Mine only died last year.
That giant controller is the best one ever made and, I dare say, might have saved that submersible! But no, they used a generic USB controller.
As someone with small hands, the Duke was the bane of my existence.