Hyundai Ioniq 5 review

Prices start from £40,695 for the base model, having been £35,995 a couple of years ago. Inflation, eh? Advance is now the entry-level trim, which bags you parking sensors, smart cruise control, the 12.3in touchscreen, a leather-wrapped heated steering wheel, heated front seats, 19in alloys, Android Auto and Apple CarPlay connectivity and a heat pump. Not bad at all.

Stepping up to the 84kWh battery with its more powerful single motor costs another £3,500 from here. The AWD option isn’t unlocked unless you bypass the next trim level (Premium) and make the step to N Line. At that point you’ll be paying £51,755 for your extra power. Yikes.

Ultimate trim (which, since the addition of the N Line S, is no longer ‘ultimate’) costs from £50,255 and adds ventilated and leather-finished front seats, heated rear seats, a digital rear view mirror, a Bose premium sound system, a head-up display, 20in wheels and more besides. Here you only get the option of the bigger battery, but you can still choose between rear- and all-wheel drive.

The N Line S is the most expensive of the lot. Priced from £53,255, it gets seriously sporty styling, electric sliding rear seats, Alcantara and leather trim and a panoramic roof.

Which would you go for?

We’d lean towards Premium trim, but with the larger battery and slightly perkier rear motor for maximum range. That spec adds intelligent LED headlights, part cloth and part leather seats, V2L capability and the clever sliding centre console.

So equipped, it’ll be £46,755. Or an £8k deposit will secure monthly repayments of £555 over a four-year term with an annual limit of 10,000 miles. Depends on the price of electricity (and fuel, of course), but you’d hope to see a significant reduction in running costs over a petrol or diesel car.

What's the recharging situation?

So far as ownership goes, Hyundai is betting hard that the Ioniq 5’s clever charging will win over new adopters. The car supports 800-volt charging – like the much more expensive Porsche Taycan – and you can juice up from nearly flat to 80 per cent in just 18 minutes.

Only got time for a five-minute pit stop? Even that buys you 62 miles. Sounds great… until you learn that all this only occurs if you can find a 350kW rapid-charger, and they’re still scarce.