Car review: Kia Stonic First Edition

A car that deserves a decent headline

Stonic boom: a top-of-the-range Kia Stonic wants for nothing but a more upmarket badge. Get past that prejudice and you’ll easily agree that the Kia is a very grown-up little car indeed (Photography by Kia)

One day we will miss the art and craft of the sub-editor, the greatest of which [or should that be whom? – subs please check] can turn the most turgid of prose and dullest of headlines into works of literary art, celestial delights of punnery and flights of word play, all of Shakespearean, Dickensian or Toby Youngesque stature. I’d certainly miss them (though I doubt the feeling is reciprocated). Not all are as well-treated and appreciated as they are here, by this publisher, you understand.

I’m not good enough to be a great, or even a mediocre, sub-editor, and I like to stick to my cliché-ridden knitting most of the time, but when I heard the name of Kia’s new little SUV I thought, what a nice headline “Kia’s Tonic” would be for the review. You can see what I’ve done there, can’t you? I toyed with “Stonic the Hedgehog” too.

‘Zest Yellow’ with black roof is one of 13 colours on offer (Kia)

Yet the narrow but very deep gulf of ability that divides me from the sub-editors is painfully clear to me, at any rate, from this, and, by the way, this sort of thing happens every working day. My puns don’t work, you see. The car isn’t hedgehog-like in any possible way, and Kia doesn’t need a “tonic” as such, as it’s done pretty well in recent years on most counts – growing sales, wider range, accomplished design and better quality.

The Stonic, though, should burnish the brand’s steadily growing presence and reputation, even though – or because – it looks so much like a new wave Citroen, with its slightly coupe-like styling and low roof line, narrow grille and clamshell style rear. I especially appreciated the satinised chrome that adorns the piano-black Kia “family face”. Overall, the Stonic looks very classy, well-proportioned and on-trend. Mine arrived in the launch colour of “Zest Yellow”, which is a touch of citron if not a clear attention to details. My test car was in “First Edition” trim, designed to give buyers a better-specced package, usually in brighter shades (as you see from the images) designed to get sales off to a good start and the new model noticed on the street.

The seats and steering wheel are heated for those chilly winter mornings (Kia)

Perhaps I ought to just say what the Kia Stonic actually is, apart from being a small car, which I’m sure you’ll have worked out by now. It is made in South Korea and was basically designed in Frankfurt, so that’s a good start. It’s one of the new breed of mini-SUVs, a “hybrid” between a small hatchback and a full-size SUV, with a raised ride height and vaguely butch looks, like a miniature Range Rover, but with no four-wheel drive ability and much the same engineering as the small car, in this case the Kia Rio, it is derived from. Thus, the Stonic has a higher centre of gravity than the Rio, and a small compromise on handling, costs about £2,000 more than its more conventional sibling (that is for similar trim and engine options) and I don’t think it adds much to the Rio in practicality, though being a high car does make it easier to get in and out of, which might be useful for older users.

Commercially, the Stonic is Kia’s answer to – deep breath – the Seat Arona, Mazda CX-3, BMW 2-series, Mercedes-Benz GLA, Renault Captur, Vauxhall Mokka, Ford Ecosport, VW T-Roc, VW Tiguan, Hyundai Kona (a sister car from the same group), the Nissan Juke, Honda HR-V, Citroen C3 Aircross, Skoda Karoq, Peugeot 2008, Mini Countryman and Audi Q2. I may have missed some. It is, in short, fashionable and finds itself in an overcrowded niche full of other cars with daft names.

A 7-year/100,000 mile transferable warranty gives considerable peace of mind (Kia)

The spec

Kia Stonic 1.0 T-GDi ‘First Edition’  
Price: £19,695 (range starts at £16,295)
Engine capacity: 1-litre petrol; 6-sp manual
Power output (bhp @ rpm): 118@6,000
Top speed (mph): 115
0-62 mph (seconds): 9.9
Fuel economy (mpg): 56.5
CO2 emissions (g/km): 115

Which is not to say it ought to be dismissed, though I feel obliged to point out that, in contrast to most of its rivals, to my surprise you sit quite low in a Stonic, cancelling out one of the few tangible advantages such a layout has for most drivers. What you get inside is pretty impressive for the sector, maybe not so surprising with such intense competition: heated steering wheel; heated front seats with three levels of, erm, bottom-warming intensity; a 6-speaker system; all-electric windows; TomTom Live; rear USB port; an attractive 7-inch touch screen for satnav and infotainment; connectivity; safety pack including autonomous braking and rear reversing camera… It’ll cost the thick end of £20,000 but a top-of-the-range Kia Stonic wants for nothing but a more upmarket badge. Get past that prejudice and you’ll easily agree that the Kia is a very grown-up little car indeed.

Practically, it offers value against most of its rivals (only a Dacia Duster will give you better) and comes with a 7-year/100,000 mile transferable warranty on all the mechanical bits. This I feel is especially important as I am a little cautious about the current vogue for fitting cars with small, highly-stressed, turbo- and/or super-charged engines. The idea is that by making the most of high-tech small capacity units, drivers get the best of all worlds – excellent fuel economy when pottering about but the ability to extract impressive performance when it is needed.

Rear reversing camera is included in the package (Kia)

My test car, for example, was a 3-cylinder 998cc petrol unit and I certainly found this Stonic to be a responsive machine with pretty good manners, but as I say I do query whether the engineering behind these sort of designs – now commonplace across the industry – is really as durable as older four-cylinder engines. Kia do in fact offer an older type of design as a 1.4 litre option, which might appeal to conservative types, and a 3-cylinder diesel which in any case would only make sense with very high mileages in prospect. There’s no automatic transmission option, by the way.

Whichever Stonic you fancy, and there’s 26 distinct variants available at launch now, the Kia warranty will look after you, I presume, whatever happens to it. I very much hope that, with the likes of Ford and VW group putting so much faith in these types of engine, they are not the next great motoring scandal waiting to happen.