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The sports sedan is packed with appealing features for a relatively low price, given that it's going up against Audis and BMWs.
When the Kia Stinger was revealed in 2017, nobody saw the BMW/Audi fighter coming from the South Korean automaker.
That said, the car - in its magnificent sleekness - was a welcome surprise. The auto world collectively salivated over the opportunity to get behind the wheel.
For us, that happened in early 2018. We spent a few days driving around the Bay Area in a $52,000 Stinger GT2; we then recreated that experience a couple of months later on the East Coast.
The car is simply splendid. It has some standout features that are worth highlighting:
Our West Coast tester arrived in "Hichroma Red." We sampled the top-of-the-line GT2, which came with every imaginable option and all-wheel drive. The sticker price was $52,300. The base four-cylinder trim level starts at $31,900, however, so you get all of this useful beauty for a lot less.
Let's start with the obvious: This is an absolutely stunning set of wheels. Kia design chief Peter Schreyer intended it to evoke the great European grand-touring cars of the past. Easily my favorite sedan on the road today, looks-wise.
Schreyer owns a Stinger — and he told me that he was stopped by the German police so they could get a closer look!
On the East Coast, I had people honking horns at me to ask if I was really driving a Kia.
Yeah, this car can gather attention, to be sure.
In keeping with a major trend, the Stinger is a fastback four-door with a smoothly sloping roofline and a hatch. If you haven't noticed already, the proportions on this car are masterful: balanced and suave, long and low.
Small complaint: Those vents on the hood are fake. Still, the overall front-end design is aggressive without being threatening.
The interior is comfortable, functional, fairly minimalist, ergonomic — and not too sporty. It has a grownup feel.
While not exactly capacious, the back seats can accommodate adults.
Hatch space is pretty good. One could easily get a long weekend's worth of luggage in here. And note those quad exhaust pipes!
The perforated, leather-wrapped steering wheel is terrific. And what's more, the instrument cluster is straightforward, uncluttered, and analog. Those gauges mean business!
What we have here is an impeccable 3.3-liter twin-turbo V6 making 365 horsepower with 376 pound-feet of torque. I did my best to squeeze some turbo-lag out of this sucker and failed.
Performance-wise, the Stinger is an absolute joy. Our all-wheel-drive tester was stable and composed at all speeds, but with a rear-wheel bias that made the car feel ever-so-slightly-slippy when pushed.
The rear-wheel-drive version should be quite a lot of fun — we'll be testing it later this year.
The 0-60mph run passes in about 4.5 seconds. Yep, the Stinger is QUICK.
The power is piped through an eight-speed automatic transmission. Sure, there are paddle shifters so you can go manual, but I found that it was best to just let the auto handle the duty. As an aside, the Stinger has the first joystick-style shifter that I've actually liked.
The Stinger provides multiple drive modes: Eco, Comfort, Sport, Smart, Custom. Smart tweaks the dynamics based on your driving style, while Custom lets you do the tweaking yourself.
Sport maximizes all the Stinger has to offer, but in my testing it also clobbered the already marginal fuel economy. That's the price you pay. Official MPGs are 19 city/25 highway/21 combined. In the Bay Area, I suspect I was getting more like 20 mpg, given that I was engaging in spirited Sport-mode piloting.
Comfort and Eco should help one to better sip the petrol, and on balance they don't detract hugely from performance — I stepped on it in both and was rewarded with plenty of pep. But Sport is where the steering is most taut, the braking most responsive, and the suspension trimmest. Some reviews of the Stinger have complained about body roll when the car is pushed, but I didn't find much of that, although I was driving on public roads rather than a track.
The infotainment system — UVO — is responsive and simple to use. It covers all the bases and is managed through this touchscreen in the center of the dash.
Our tester came with a Harman Kardon premium audio system and SiriusXM satellite radio, which sounded superb. Navigation helped me find my way around the Bay, from the city to Silicon Valley and even over to Fremont, and Bluetooth device pairing was a snap.
On the East Coast, the system also performed flawlessly.
And the coolest feature of all? Yep, it's the Kia badge!
That's right, the Stinger is a KIA! A halo car is supposed to, you know, create a shiny glowing halo around a brand, and the Stinger more than achieves that goal for Kia.
The carmaker should be rightly proud to have its badge on a car this good.
