2018 Hyundai Accent Completes Puberty, Becomes Full-Grown Car

Steph Willems
by Steph Willems

It looks like the awkward years are over for the subcompact Hyundai Accent.

Our first glimpse of the next-generation Accent comes courtesy of leaked photos from China, where the model goes by the name Verna. In them, the Accent appears all grown up, adopting a large grille and styling reminiscent of its bigger brother, the Elantra.

The model, which will appear sometime next year as a 2018 model, grows slightly in width and length. There’s talk that a hatchback version won’t accompany the sedan seen in the leaked photos, which seems almost sacrilegious, given the Accent’s roots.

Speaking of talk, you’re not likely to hear many animated water cooler conversations about the Accent, but it remains an important model for the automaker. Hyundai sold 61,486 of them in the U.S. last year, so it’s not about to start ignoring its entry in the subcompact market.

But back to that grille. The first Accents to reach North American shores back in the mid-1990s featured a plastic-heavy face with a vestigial front air slot resembling something you’d see living near the ocean floor. The model received regular styling updates through the years, and a healthy dose of competitive technology arrived in 2011, but this redesign really closes the door on its lackluster econobox past.

[Source: AutoHome] [Image: Wikimedia Commons]

Steph Willems
Steph Willems

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  • Paragon Paragon on Jul 18, 2016

    Verna is starting to look like she's got "potential." If-you-know-what-I-mean. In a small car sedan way. Even if I didn't have much money, I bet I could get with her.

  • 415s30 415s30 on Jul 24, 2016

    Turns out an accent doesn't make everyone sexy...

  • Ronin It's one thing to stay tried and true to loyal past customers; you'll ensure a stream of revenue from your installed base- maybe every several years or so.It's another to attract net-new customers, who are dazzled by so many other attractive offerings that have more cargo capacity than that high-floored 4-Runner bed, and are not so scrunched in scrunchy front seats.Like with the FJ Cruiser: don't bother to update it, thereby saving money while explaining customers like it that way, all the way into oblivion. Not recognizing some customers like to actually have right rear visibility in their SUVs.
  • MaintenanceCosts It's not a Benz or a Jag / it's a 5-0 with a rag /And I don't wanna brag / but I could never be stag
  • 3-On-The-Tree Son has a 2016 Mustang GT 5.0 and I have a 2009 C6 Corvette LS3 6spd. And on paper they are pretty close.
  • 3-On-The-Tree Same as the Land Cruiser, emissions. I have a 1985 FJ60 Land Cruiser and it’s a beast off-roading.
  • CanadaCraig I would like for this anniversary special to be a bare-bones Plain-Jane model offered in Dynasty Green and Vintage Burgundy.
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