The Kia Stonic is the South Korean carmaker’s latest entry to the local crossover segment, arriving in late 2020. In the Philippines, the Kia Stonic competes with the likes of the Ford EcoSport and the MG ZS.
Interested to find out if the Kia Stonic is worth your money? Today, we look at reasons why you should (and why you probably shouldn’t) buy a Kia Stonic.
Being a modern machine, it’s expected for the Kia Stonic to look good. Kia made sure that each exterior element was carefully designed to make the new Stonic look its best from all angles.
At the front end, you’ve got the iconic tiger-nose grille flanked by aggressive-looking headlamps on each side. Its side profile is improved with 16-inch alloy wheels and a roof rail up above. At the rear is a fin-type antenna, striking rear combination lamps, a rear spoiler, and backup lamps with rear reflectors.
The Kia Stonic is available in six colors: Clear White, Clear White with Black, Extreme Blue, Flame Orange with Black, Flash Yellow with Black, and Prime Red.
For a compact crossover, the Kia Stonic offers a surprisingly spacious cabin. One of the main reasons why passengers get more than enough headroom and legroom is how Kia designed its seats. They slant a little, allowing one’s bottoms to sit slightly lower, thus giving way for more room in both the head and knee area.
Kia also applied the same principle when designing the boot area with the actual luggage space sitting lower than the rear lip. This gives more than enough room for one’s necessities such as weekly laundries or groceries.
With the rear seats up, you’re looking at 325 liters of cargo space, and more, with the rear seats folded.
The Kia Stonic packs an eight-inch touchscreen infotainment system with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto capabilities. This allows iPhone and Android smartphone users to seamlessly use their devices with the car’s onboard infotainment unit.
The eigh-inch screen also doubles as a rearview camera which should help you when parking in tight spots.
The Kia Stonic is currently offered in four variants. One of these, the base model, has a manual transmission. Although all variants are powered by a 1.4-liter gasoline powerplant and makes 132Nm of torque, the variant mated to a five-speed manual tranny only produces 94 horses compared to its automatic transmission variant that produces 99 horses.
Although the Kia Stonic does offer enough headroom and legroom, its rear seating can sometimes be a bit cramped, sidewise that is. Effective though the tick is, it’s not enough to address the limited width this compact crossover has to offer.
That said, having three adults riding at the rear would definitely put them in a position where they’d be rubbing elbows with each other during the entire ride.
Photos from Kia
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