- That's the new Kia Seltos. Now, it doesn't cost a lot of money. It's in the $20,000 range, but there's a lot of really cool design details all over the car that shows that you don't have to spend a lot of money to get something you'd actually like to be seen in.
Now, despite the details I'm going to go in, just in general, this is a really clean, nicely proportioned design. You do see the contrasting roof a lot of places. But here, it's not contrived, and it works well. It's not too evocative of other vehicles.
But here's some of those details. And one of the things you're going to find here is this pattern, this kind of geometric pattern throughout the car. And you can most see it here in Kia's signature grill. And there actually is some texture to it. It's really nice detail.
You do have signature lighting here. You have LED lights for the fog lights on this upper trim level. Just on the wheels here, you can see that there's a red detail.
Now, one of the things I really like are the roof rails. Now, usually, roof rails or nothing you'd ever notice. But check out this really cool detail at the back that sticks out, very cool.
Around the back here, you have LED tail lights, nice interesting design. Then you have the alloy trim. Again, you know, there is some jewelry on this car, but it is, generally, tastefully applied.
Now, it's the interior where the concept of getting a lot of interesting design for not a lot of money is best shown. You know, there's a lot of hard plastic in this car. On the doors, hard plastic-- on the center console, hard plastic, on the dash top, hard plastic, more than you'd get in Kia's own Sportage, let alone something like a Honda CRV or Toyota RAV-4. This could seem awfully cheap and low-rent, and yet it doesn't because of its thoughtful and clever and creative design.
Let's just look at the speakers here, an interesting geometric pattern. It is textured and three-dimensional. You don't see that in anything, so that's unique, regardless of the price point, more of that geometric pattern up here. And then this may be hard plastic up here, but along this trim panel is simulated leather, and it is actually stitched.
Another detail I like is this metal trim grab handle. And then as the rain falls even harder, the air vents, I really like how they align with this trim panel around the Start/Stop button.
Now, you can outfit the Seltos with Kia's latest widescreen touch interface. This is basically the same as what you'd get in a Telluride. It obviously comes with Apple Car Play. And because it's widescreen, it's split into thirds. And two thirds are one screen, and then there's the other third. You can go through various vehicle functions.
Go to Kia Land, and there's some interesting elements here. You can go to the sounds of nature button, don't need that. OK, if you want to feel like the car is on fire. Do I-- lively forest.
Now, do I want to listen to this while I'm driving? I don't know. I think it would make me fall asleep, but-- especially this one, or it would make you want to pee. And again, don't need that.
Now, besides the design, this is actually quite functional. There's quite a lot of backseat space, and the trunk offers a lot of room for luggage. But then you also have thoughtful storage. Those are big door bins.
I really like this double-tiered smartphone area. You can see, there's a larger bin there. But then up above, there's a separate rubber tray that is where the wireless charging is. So basically, there's room for two different smartphones or whatever else you want in there. There's a second smaller bin there. You know, again, these are kind of cheap cup holders, nothing really to keep them in place.
So you know, you do see the price point occasionally. But in general, this cabin just looks special. It looks different. So you don't have to spend a lot of money to get that, and I think that's going to make this car stand out in a very crowded field.
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