You know the deal with this sort of thing, right: new bumper, slightly different grille, lights marginally reshaped. Well, the Kia Rio that’s due in showrooms this Autumn will look slightly different to the current one, in those ways. And more.
The other thing that usually happens with a car’s midlife update is more stuff. And so every Rio now comes with full LED headlights, a wider infotainment screen (now an eight-incher) and…believe it or not…a height adjustable driver’s seat as standard. Yes, we’d assumed that was already standard too. An adjustable passenger seat still isn’t standard fit though. That’s an option.
There are two new colours – a shade of grey and a shade of blue – and in the cabin you can brighten things up with an optional blue trim pack. The alloy wheels you seen in the pictures is a new design too.
New tech includes the addition of Apple CarPlay, but not just any old Apple Carplay – wireless Apple CarPlay. The Android one is wireless too. And if you buy into a new Rio with a high enough specification for it to include navigation, you can now use voice commands to tell it where to go. where to go in the literal sense, no the pejorative one.
Power wise, there’s a new version coming called Smartstream, which might sound like a fancy toilet but is actually a mild hybrid version of the 1.0-litre T-GDI petrol engine, which improves fuel economy by 10%. A mild hybrid is generally a large starter motor that captures brake energy and can use the reserves not only to power the car’s electrics but provide assistance to the engine, either as a performance enhancing boost or to allow fuel-less coasting. It will also allow the start-stop system to cut off the engine before it’s come to a full stop.
The mild hybrid 1.0-litre car comes with outputs of 99bhp and 118bhp to choose from, and there’s a less sophisticated (and therefore cheaper to buy) 1.2-litre petrol engine too, with 83bhp.
No prices or specifications yet, but expect a few hundred quid to be added to the prices of today’s variants.
Keyword: The Kia Rio has been updated