![Illinois Auto Dealers Sue State Over Rivian’s Direct-Sales Model [UPDATED]](https://www.thetruthaboutcars.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/rivian-suv-610x407.jpg)
Coming on the heels of the Sportspace Concept, the 2016 Kia Optima made its global debut at the 2015 New York Auto Show.
Two engines carried over from the outgoing model will join a third engine for the 2016 model year. The carry-overs are a 2.4-liter direct-injection naturally aspirated four and a 2-liter direct-injection turbo-four, delivering 185 horses and 247 horses through a six-speed automatic to the front. The third engine is a 1.6-liter turbo-four paired with a seven-speed dual-clutch gearbox found in the Hyundai Sonata Eco.
Inside, soft-touch materials, metallic accents, real stitching in the dash and door panels, and cloth or leather seating await occupants. Meanwhile, Kia’s UVO connected-vehicle system comes with four new features not previously found in the Optima, including curfew alert and geo-fencing. The Optima itself is the pilot vehicle for the brand’s introduction of Android Auto and Apple CarPlay systems, allowing iPhone and Android users to use their smartphones in conjunction with UVO.
Pricing wasn’t announced at this time, but Kia said to expect the 2016 Optima to hit showrooms in Q4 2015.
They should rename it to Kia Hydro Schick
It’s bad enough that now when you select the base trim you get a tiny radio stuck in the hole made for the nav screen, but now even with the large touch screen you STILL get a huge black plastic surround around the screen. Is Kia planning on a 10-12″ screen a couple years from now?! My GMC Sierra has the exact same problem – 8″ screen in a 12″ hole.
“My GMC Sierra has the exact same problem – 8″ screen in a 12″ hole.”
That’s what she said
*rimshot*
“like throwing a hotdog down a hallway”
They took what I considered to be a fairly nice interior and made it an also-ran. Meh.
Same with the outside. It looks like Toyota got ahold of it and turned down the volume from 11 to, like, 7. Now theat they extended the backseat’s window, the C/D pillar weirdness just looks bad.
Actually think the interior is a nice improvement; the exterior, not so much.
Dang that’s a lot of buttons.
+1 Seems very busy to me also.
Hmm. I really like the exterior, but I agree with Timothy that the interior isn’t as nice as the current model.
Kia’s press release says it will be available in Q4 2015, not 2016.
No word on the hybrid version yet.
I think it’s the color. Gray on gray on gray never looks good.
I’ve spent a fair bit of time in the ’12 that a friend had, his was light tan with wood. I think in the same color scheme the new interior would look pretty much the same, and in all gray his would look just as bad.
The new KIA grill is kinda creepy – is that just a top-trim thing or do they all have them. My friend with the Optima just traded it for an absolutely hard-loaded every box ticked $48K+ Sorrento SX-L and it has the same funky grill. It’s weirder in person than in pictures, not sure how to even describe it. I think on the Sorrento it might even be metal! Didn’t really feel like plastic when I fondled it.
That grill treatment works on the larger Kia grills (K900, Sorento, Sedona), but not so much here.
Nice Mazda6 dashboard. It continues the theme of this being a sporty looking sedan that doesn’t deliver as such from behind the wheel.
I wonder if they improved the front seats. To me it was the fatal flaw in an otherwise competitive and appealing midsizer.
I agree. And feel bad since it is such a nice looking car. In fact, it kills its Sonata at Hyundai.
My perfect car would be a Mazda6 S again with a 6…in its Wagon form.
Hyundai, Malibu and now Kia. All reducing power and torque in their engines? Troops retreating in a battlefield? Do they expect me to support that? Not gonna happen.
I doubt they really did reduce the power. The old Optima certainly never felt remotely like it had the alleged 274hp. 247 is probably a whole lot more realistic. My suspicion is they retuned to move the torque peak down and wider, which made the power band lower but broader and reduced the peak hp, and probably eliminated any need for premium gas which reduced it a little more. That 274hp was probably on 93 octane on a cold winter day only.
Certainly my “230hp” BMW feels MUCH faster than a “274hp” Optima when you get on it, and all the magazine testing bears that out. Not that much difference in weight between them.
Well, guess the Optima has been nerfed. Shame.
Up to now, I haven’t really been indulging people who’ve said that Kia is a knock-off brand. But that interior is so obviously cribbed from BMW, it’s not even funny. They even managed to clone the silver rim around the infotainment screen and the motif surrounding the center stack buttons.
I am not pleased. This is a giant step back from the outgoing Optima, particularly in that it looks insecure and relatively mediocre.
Doesn’t look like any BMW I have ever been in, old or new. It does look pretty much like the previous one in a really drab gray color scheme that causes the silver highlights to stand out more.
Center console (radio, climateC, screen) is copied from the current 5-series IMO
It’s got some Beemer vibe inside.
But, my Gawd, they made the outside worse!
The interior definitely looks like they wanted to evoke BMW. Not as much as the interior and exterior of the K900 do, but it seems like a trend.
It’s just a mid-cycle facelift. And based on comments here and elsewhere, not even a very successful one.
So what MCR has changes to platform dimensions?
I came really close to getting a 2014 Optima; ended up with a 15 Sonata. The dealbreaker for the Optima (aside from it being more expensive, though much better equipped) was that despite looking nice and feeling nice, there was something just a bit… *loose* about it. It felt a bit like I was on a movie set, with everything looking great but ragged when you reach around back, like it was all just printed onto the surface. And it drove the same way; it just wasn’t quite there: On the surface it was fine, but compared to the Sonata it was just a little bit wobbly, a little bit unsettled, a little bit…. *not quite*.
I agree that the new interior (the dash at least) doesn’t quite measure up to the old one, but if they’ve fixed the car’s general not-quite-ness (and if I’m not cross-shopping S60s and Genesises… Geneses?) then I’ll probably take a look when my Optima’s lease is up.
Ultimately, you get what you pay for. If you want a pile of toys for not a pile of cash and don’t care so much about the little details, then a KIA is kind of awesome value. As an example, to option a 328i to the same level as a $37K Optima limited is *$57K*, and you still won’t have vented seats, since they can’t be had on a 328i. My buddy Greg LOVED both his loaded Optima and now his all bells and whistles Sorrento SX-L. Me, I much prefer my pauper spec BMW wagon that cost the same as the uber-loaded KIA CUV. I like feel, he likes toys. Different strokes for different folks.
I am ashamed to admit that I was much the cause of that 4yo but <10K mile Optima getting traded in. One evening during our hellish February I picked him up to go out to dinner in my old Range Rover on a nasty night. We had gotten 8"+ of snow and he had not cleared his driveway. The way the Rover dismissed the unplowed snow and the 2' plow berm at the end of the driveway was the beginning of the end of the Optima. I have told him he needs snow tires to do anything like that though. And of course he always complained about how the all-season shod Optima did in the snow…
You can say the same thing for a Camry, Malibu, etc. vs a 3 Series, and sometimes you don’t get what you pay for – like the original X3 which truly had a horrendously chinzy interior (for what you paid for) and then to top it off, the ride was brittle as well.
Err, I meant when my *Sonata’s* lease is up.
The gap between the Sonata and the Genesis is similar; the Genesis is basically a Sonata except with everything done better that should have been done better. The Sonata is solid and everything is done really well, but it’s nowhere near my Saab 9-5 in terms of the little stuff (and some of the big stuff). The Genesis is mostly a cut above the 9-5 (haven’t driven one yet).
It’s kind of interesting how it all works out.
The Sonata is little like the Genesis.
That’s like saying the Camry is like the GS.
Most auto reviewers thought the Optima (in SX trim) drove better than the Sonata (SE trim) and in terms of fit and finish and interior materials, the Optima was better than the Sonata.
Furthermore, Kia offered the SXL trim which had Nappa leather (including on the door panels) which was a good bit more luxurious than what Hyundai offered on its top level Sonata.
Hello 2011 Stretched Kia Forte… oh wait!
Well, it was nice while it lasted. The previous K5, I mean. That was a handsome car, the one that made me aware of Kia as a brand. This… studied hard at the Sonata school of disappointing sequels.