The Stinger was a bold bet on the part of Kia, which greatly helped to raise awareness of the brand and its capabilities.
Launched in 2017, this sportier-looking saloon — a rival for cars like the BMW 4 Series Gran Coupé — sits on a rear-wheel drive platform and brings aesthetic and dynamic attributes to the Kia that we've been unaccustomed to seeing.
And it ended up being very well received by critics, who praised its handling and behavior and, in the case of the Stinger GT, equipped with a 3.3 V6 twin turbo with 370 hp, also for its performance.
But despite the praise from the media — including ours, when we tested the Stinger in Portugal — the truth is that Kia Stinger's commercial career has been, to say the least, discreet, which has raised doubts about its future.
These doubts seem to be moving quickly towards certainty given the statements of Karim Habib, head of design at Kia, to the British publication Autocar during the Los Angeles Motor Show, when asked about the future of the Stinger.
Karim Habib, Head of Design at Kia“The spirit of the Stinger remains and will remain. I like to think that the EV6 has the genes of the Stinger GT (V6). Let's make a GT and it has the Stinger in it.
The Stinger was a transformative car and opened up a whole new perspective on what the Kia can be, sporty and an accurate driving tool. The EV6 will now do something similar."
EV6, the replacement for the Kia Stinger?
The Kia EV6 is the South Korean brand's first all-electric model, based on Hyundai Motor Group's new electric-specific platform, the E-GMP.
It takes on the contours of a somewhat large crossover, formally having nothing to do with the Kia Stinger. However, it promises unprecedented levels of performance in a Kia.
As Karim Habib mentioned, they will also make a GT version of the EV6 and it will be, by a comfortable margin, the most powerful road Kia ever: 584 hp (and 740 Nm).
To demonstrate its potential, the South Korean brand did not shy away from putting the EV6 GT in a drag race against real sports cars (combustion)… and a Lamborghini Urus. Despite not having won the race, the McLaren 570S that won it only surpassed the EV6 GT towards the end of this short race.
However, could an electric crossover be a real substitute for a more “crawler” saloon praised for its handling and dynamic skills? Probably not. But its role as the brand's halo model, helping to change the perception of Kia, seems to be exactly the same as Stinger's.