Kia Sorento v Hyundai Santa Fe 2021 comparison review: Which 7-seat SUV is best?

G'day, I'm Paul. Today we're doing a comparison between the Hyundai Santa Fe and the Kia Sorento. If you're new to our channel, welcome. If you're not, you'll know that this isn't a format that we've done before. So we're trying this out, want to see how it works. We thought about getting both cars back in and doing this all from scratch, but I don't know, what's the point? It's more efficient if we can just take the detailed reviews we've already shot and then put this together. What I'll be able to do is give you a verdict at the end of each section, and then at the end of the video, I'll let you know which of these two cars you should be picking. So we are comparing the Hyundai Santa Fe Highlander and the Kia Sorento GT line. They're both top specs, both seven seats, both diesel, and both around the $65,000 mark. If you do want to skip ahead to any other parts of this comparison, you can use the time codes up on the screen, or if you're on YouTube, just scroll down and use the chapters below. And I've left links to the full reviews of both of these cars in the description. And if you haven't done so already, make sure you subscribe to our channel so you can find out every single time we drive something new. Let's talk exterior, and we'll start with the Santa Fe. You've got seven external colours to pick from, and everything but blue and white are about $700 extra. Now, let's quickly talk about the design, because Igor, cameraman, thinks it looks absolutely amazing. I'm not so convinced. I always thought the last one looked okay, but I think they've taken a step backwards with this. Let me know what you think down in the comments section. Okay, so let's start with the grille. It is a whopper. So, big grille down here, you've got a huge Hyundai logo, and that's finished in an interesting material. It's like a reflective, sort of glossy, chrome-style material. I think this actually looks good, this part of the car, same with the chrome highlights down the bottom. It's like a brushed aluminium in terms of the design. So I think that all looks good. Where I think it takes a little deviation, though, is with the headlight cluster. So up the top, you have LED daytime running lights, you also have an indicator built in, but this is the headlight cluster. So full LED headlights, you can see those projectors just there. They're adaptive as well. It's just interesting. It's a different philosophy and a different way to do things. It kind of looks a bit like the Palisade as well, so you can see where they drew that inspiration from. But yeah, let me know what you think of the design. We'll whip around to the side here. Now, you've got 20-inch alloy wheels. They're whoppers. I quite like this wheel design. It's got that glossy chrome matte finish on the outside, and then a graphite finish on the inside. And they've got this sort of design that makes them look like they're moving. See how they sort of spin back a little bit. I'm going to refer to my VPSS Commodore here for Hyundai's design inspiration. Kind of a similar design where it spins back. So yeah, interesting. Low profile-ish tyre, 45 profile along the side there. Given Hyundai does local ride and handling tuning, I'm hoping this actually rides well on Australian roads. Now, you can see here that they've been a little restrained in terms of the wheel arch flares. So normally this would be like a black plastic cladding, but they've kept it body coloured, which I think is a better look because it blends in far more nicely with the rest of the package. Around here you have an indicator built into that wing mirror with a camera there for the 360 camera. We have roof rails, privacy glass, and then around the back here you have that spoiler built into the tailgate, a shark fin antenna. And while this looks fairly common to the last generation of the Santa Fe, you can see here that these LED taillights have been refined a bit. So a bit more definition to them. They kind of look like the Audi e-tron GT with that sort of wraparound styling. So, quite like that design. Then you have the engine designation there, 2.2 diesel H-Trac, because this is all-wheel drive. And then Santa Fe plus the spec, the Highlander. Righto, moving on to the Sorento, you've got seven colours to choose from. All but white is an additional $695. Now onto styling. I think this is probably the coolest part about this car. It's a little hard to see from front on, but looking through there you can see like a chisel that comes down around the front here and then tapers in. You've got this 3D looking grille. This car turns a lot of heads despite the fact it's A, a Kia, and B, an SUV. You wouldn't expect those two things a few years ago, so it's cool to see that they have evolved the styling. Now it's interesting here as well that with these dark colours, there's a beautiful offset between the body colour and then this piano black. I'm normally not a fan of piano black, but it really works well here offset against those dark colours. And then when I talk about technology, you can see the litany of sensors and cameras that are all around this car, and I'll run through those in a bit more detail later on, but it's good to see that they have got with the times here, and when you are spending around the $65,000 mark, you're getting technology on this car that you would expect to see on some high-end European cars, which is pretty cool. In terms of headlight technology, full LED headlights. This section down here is the LED daytime running light, but it's also the indicator, so when you flick that on, that really lights up nicely and it looks really cool at night time. A little chisel in there with an air duct as well, and then around the side here, 20-inch alloy wheels. Normally that sends shivers down my spine because it means the ride is going to be terrible, so let's see what it's like today. They're a 45 profile tyre, so there is a fair bit of rubber there, but 20-inch alloy wheels on a family SUV can be a little bit dangerous, so we'll see how that goes. But I like the design, it's like a sort of brushed shadow chrome, it looks pretty cool. Jump around to the side of the car, a little bit more of that brushed chrome along the side here. Let me know in the comments below, what is that actually called? I don't think it's aluminium, but it's got that brushed look to it. Indicator built into the mirror there. You've got a panoramic glass roof, roof rails, privacy glass. Come around to the back here, I think this is the best angle. Have a look at these lights, how sleek are they? They sort of taper around the side there, and it has a bit of that American design built into it. LED lights there in those columns. You've got big Sorento badge down the bottom there, and then GT line as well. It's quite a nice, accomplished looking rear end, and it gives this car a bit of masculinity. It looks pretty tough out on the road, despite the fact it has back exhaust pipes. Okay, so I know that design is entirely subjective, but I think Kia has done a better job with the Sorento over and above the Santa Fe in terms of making it feel newer. When you look at the current generation of Sorento compared to the previous one, they look completely different. Whereas with the Santa Fe, it kind of looks the same as the previous generation, and that's despite the fact both of these sit on a brand new platform. So in terms of a verdict on the exterior, I think the Sorento has the win here. Now, despite the fact they both share the same platform, when we're talking about interiors, they look entirely different. Okay, we are inside the Santa Fe. Let's start with the key. Here it is here. So you have lock, unlock, boot. You have a remote parking feature, plus a remote start function, which will run the heater or the air conditioner if you need to. Hyundai logo on the back. Proximity sensing key, so you just leave that in your pocket, grab the door handle, and then once you're inside, you have a push button start. Also like the material on that, that's sort of cold to the touch, a bit of real metal, which is cool. Okay, design. Let's talk about that first. Sorry about the beeping. Kia, Hyundai product, it means throughout the whole video it's going to be beeping. Yeah, design. I really like what they've done here. So this is getting expensive now, it's about $70,000 on the road, so you are spending a fair bit of money on this car, but I think they make you feel good about spending that kind of money. So we've gone to a lot of effort to do soft touch materials along the dashboard. You can see here with the contrast colours that it really makes the cabin pop. Then you've got this infotainment system that's lodged up the top there. Little bit of speaker branding for what's going on around the cabin and you'll notice with the speaker covers, they also have a 3D effect similar to the Sorento. That continues down here where you've got this sort of, it's not metal but it's made to look like a brushed metal material. And then the seats as well, they've got the diamond stitching on them. It is a really nice looking cabin, even to, sorry I keep finding things here, even to the sort of suede headliner as well. So it does feel high end and premium but I don't know, I just think it's let down by this. There are so many buttons there, it is really confusing to look at and I wish they could just condense that a little bit instead of having a button explosion there. So anyway, now touch points. They are soft on the centre console there, fairly soft on the door as well. How soft are they? Well we've tested them with our gyrometer, if you want to see how this car compares to other cars we've tested before, follow the link in the description. Now, build quality, what's it like? It all feels really nice and solid which is excellent. We're inside the Sorento now and we'll start with the key. This is a slightly different design to the standard Kia key. Slightly larger, so you can see on the back there, there is nothing. If I tilt it around to the side you have lock, unlock and boot which you can push and hold because it's a powered tailgate. On the front there you can see remote engine start, a remote parking feature, then a Kia logo down the bottom. There's also a proximity sensing key, so you just leave that in your pocket, grab the door handle and then once you're inside, hit the start button. Now what about styling? When I first hopped into this car, I was really, really impressed with how high-end this looks. When you're paying $65,000 odd for a top specification Sorento, you actually don't feel too bad about it because it is beautifully presented. It looks high-end and premium. It kind of reminds me a bit of an S-Class in the way that those screens are set up with those two big screens next to each other. But then beyond that, you have this brushed sort of, I don't know what this is, it's not aluminium, it's some weird material, but inside the door inlays as well, they light up so you have a lot of ambient lighting that just looks fantastic at night. Even the detail here around these air vents, they just look really cool. Now this is interesting as well, the gear shifter has gone, so the traditional one has been replaced with this circular unit. Obviously it just works by turning it, but I love the fact that this is metallic and knurled. Have a listen. It just makes this car feel really luxurious, those little touches there. It is let down by piano black and, I don't know, I've said this a million times, they continue using this stuff and look at that, there are just fingerprints all over that. I don't know, it just seems impossible to keep clean, so a strange thing to have. What about the materials? Well, all around the car here, everything feels nice and soft. And then touch points, that's all nice and soft. And then on the door as well, that's all nicely padded. But how soft is it? Well, we've got our durometer here, which tests from 0 to 100 and we've tested all the surfaces around this car. If you want to see how it compares to other cars, simply click on the link in the description below. Now what about build quality? Look, it seems pretty good. This is a little bit loose around here, but for the most part, all of this fits in really nicely. Now I was pretty impressed with the interiors of both of these cars. When you're talking about this kind of money, they actually feel like they're a whole lot more expensive and they kind of give you that Euro car vibe as opposed to just being, and I say just being, but just being a Korean car. It's not something that you would expect to see in this segment. So a big tick on both of the fronts in terms of luxury. I think the Kia is better presented, but it's the Hyundai that feels more premium. I love the fact that you can pick the different interior colours. You've got that beautiful headliner as well. They really go that extra step to make the interior feel more inviting. I don't like the button explosion though. There are so many buttons on that centre stack. But if you put that to one side, I think the Santa Fe nudges ahead ever so slightly in the interior stacks and takes the win there. Now this will probably surprise nobody, but the infotainment systems are very similar because they come from the same parent company. So let's have a closer look at those now. Okay, let's start with the Santa Fe. So it consists of a 10.25-inch colour touchscreen. You do have shortcut buttons down here on this submenu. And then you can also use the buttons alongside the left-hand side of the screen. So it has inbuilt satellite navigation. This is what that looks like. Unfortunately, like all Hyundai and Kia products, pressing the voice recognition button doesn't do anything unless you have smartphone mirroring paired. Now speaking of which, smartphone mirroring comes in the form of Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. It is a cabled system. I'll show you what Apple CarPlay looks like first. So it doesn't take up the entire screen, which is really interesting. It's sort of all boxed off to the corner there. If I press that, no, it doesn't help. So maybe there's a setting in there. If there is, let me know in the comments section. But I couldn't really find anything. And this is what Android Auto looks like. Also not a full-screen integration, which is interesting. But, yep, nice and snappy there. No dramas. Audio comes in the form of AM, FM, and DAB plus digital radio. There's also a Harman Kardon branded sound system. Now ahead of the driver is another digital display. I'll show you what that looks like. On the left, you have your speedometer. On the right, you have warnings plus a tachometer. The display also changes when you flick through different drive modes. You can also change the centre of the display to show you other things. So really nice integration, and very quick and snappy. It's quite sharp and fast, which I love. Now, what about the Sorento? Earlier I mentioned that this car is jam-packed full of technology, and a lot of it falls into the infotainment category. It all starts over here with the 10.25-inch infotainment system. Now you can't really see anything here because we're in the middle of nowhere, but this gives you a shaded map overlay along with the clock and the time, plus your battery discharge warning and also the driver profiles in the top left of the screen. But if we swipe over, this is where you'll find the rest of the menus. You have shortcut buttons on the side there so you can go straight to your in-built satellite navigation. That doesn't require any internet connectivity or a phone connected to the vehicle. And then in terms of radio, you have AM FM DAB Plus digital radio, so it's a fully-featured system. In terms of phone connectivity, you have Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. It's a wired system, so you've got to have a cable there. And I'll show you what that looks like if we go to the Home menu and then hit Apple CarPlay. The resolution is incredible. If I get right in there, I can't even see the pixels. It is super high-res. It takes up the entire screen. That is a very, very impressive setup and absolutely love the look of that. Now in terms of Android Auto, I'll show you what that looks like. It's not that great because it's all compressed into that little screen. It's not a full-screen integration like Apple CarPlay. It is kind of limited in that sense, so that's a little bit disappointing. Moving on from the central infotainment screen, ahead of the driver, you have this 12.3-inch display. Another high-resolution screen. On the left-hand side, you have a speedometer. On the right-hand side, you have a tachometer. Now, if you scroll through the center here, you'll be able to see the different context menus. So you have a display there for the speedometer, an attention-level display, and then it goes through and gives you other options for a compass, the driver assistance controls, tyre pressures, so on and so forth. And then ahead of the driver, you also have a head-up display that shows you your speed, also the radar cruise and lane-keeping assistant. The other interesting feature there is the blind-spot monitor appears not only on the head-up display and in the wing mirrors, but also in this cluster here, and we'll have a look at that when we go for a drive. Yeah, so the infotainment systems are really similar, but the good news is that they work really well. Big-resolution screens, and it also means that when you do hook up your smartphone for mirroring, everything looks nice and sharp. The only downside is there's no wireless connectivity for Apple CarPlay or Android Auto, despite the fact you can get that on the cheaper versions of these infotainment systems. But if you put those things to one side, it is surprising just how much they've been able to cram into these infotainment systems. Now, what about safety? They're both family cars, you want to have a pretty comprehensive set of safety features, and thankfully, both of them do. These include things like autonomous emergency braking forwards and reverse, turn-assist at junctions, multi-collision brake assistance, blind-spot monitoring and assist, lane-keeping assistant, lane-following assistant, rear-cross traffic alert, and adaptive cruise control. Now, I'm not going to bother giving you a verdict for the safety because, I don't know, they're both virtually identical in terms of the safety features they both get. But where they do differ a little bit is in terms of comfort and practicality for the first, second, third rows, and the boot. First up, let's look at the Santa Fe. Talking about practicality, we'll start with connectivity. You have one USB port here, you have a 12V outlet down here, and then another USB port there. You can also charge your phone wirelessly and it's quite a clever system. I haven't seen something like this before. So the charging pad sits like that and then you slide your phone in behind a set of teeth. So, really cool setup. Now, in terms of storage for your phone, it can live in the cup holders in that wireless charging slot down here on that storage tray. Your coffee cup has a rightful place over here with plenty of clearance for the lid. Bottle storage without the tape Down here you can store a bottle. You've got more storage up the top there. There's also teeth in that one. You've got storage for a bottle plus odds and ends inside the door. The center console is huge. It's nice and deep so you can see how big that is. We also have a glovebox down here with pretty decent storage and then another trinket tray just above it. Moving on to comfort, you have tri-zone automatic climate control. You have heated and cooled seats for the front row. Heated steering wheel. The seats are electrically adjustable in the front row. You also have memory for the driver's seat. Steering is tilt and reach adjustable as well and your million buttons are easy to reach while you're driving and finally you have a panoramic glass sunroof. Okay, we're in the second row of the Santa Fe. Let's start off with room. I've got a decent amount of knee room, heaps of toe room and headroom is reasonable despite this giant roof here. It's actually massive. It looks really good. It goes all the way back behind your head so you get some nice visibility out of the roof. Let's talk about our bottle and where we can store that. So you have a center armrest here with two cup holders plus a little mini cup holder. You can easily fit your bottle in there. Then you also have storage inside the door for a bottle. You've got map pockets. You have two USB points down here. You have air vents plus the ability to move the passenger seat forwards and backwards. If you own one of these tell me if that gets annoying with the kids. You also have heated seats on the two outboard seats. There's blinds that pop up here to give you a bit of privacy. You've got ISOFIX points on the two outboard seats and then three top tether points. Now what you can do as well, it's a 60-40 split folding seat. You can actually give your third row passengers a little bit more room by shifting this forwards and backwards. Now to access the third row it's pretty straightforward. There is a button on top of the seat. You can actually either fold this flat or by pushing the button it tumbles and then slides forward. Now I have to caveat this by saying this is obviously a spot for kids but let's see how it goes with adults anyway. So I'll climb in. I'm too old for this. Okay there we go. So what I'll do now is bring this seat back and then lock that into position. I can actually move that back if I need to. So this gives you an idea of how much room I have here. This is the standard position and there I'm sort of wedged up against it but because the second row can slide forwards I actually have a reasonable amount of room here. I've got decent toe room. Knee room's fine. My head is sort of wedged up against the roof but I think if you had to travel back here as an adult it would be perfectly fine. You have storage slots off to the sides with cup holders on each side. There's one USB port over here and your right hand side passenger also controls the third row AC and there's air vents for both sides as well. So Igor do you want to just show us how much leg room there is behind the passenger seat there? So that gives you an idea of just how much room there is when you have an adult back here. I don't hate it to be honest. Let's talk cargo space. Crack this open. So being a three row SUV you don't really have a great deal of space behind the third row. Here you have around 100 litres of cargo space and you'll see that it's not really enough to actually store anything meaningful because that won't close with the boot in that position. Under the cargo floor you have a cargo blind. The actual spare tyre is underneath the vehicle. Now let's drop this third row because there's a couple of configuration options in terms of space that's available. So to do that you just pull these tabs. That drops out of the way. Now with this space here you can configure it two ways. In its current form it's around 600 litres but if you slide the second row forward it can go up to 800 litres and I'll show you what it looks like with our bags in there. There you go so you can see there's plenty of storage space there. There is one other party trick and that is to drop the second row which you can do from back here by pushing these two buttons that increases the space to around 1700 litres so it is a whopper. Moving on to the Kia Sorento and let's start with connectivity. You have one USB port that's available for smartphone mirroring. You have two charging USB ports, a wireless phone charger of a Qi standard. Now you may be wondering where is the 12 volt outlet here? Nowhere to be found. This is the first car I've seen without a 12 volt outlet up front. There's only one in the second row so it's interesting that moving on from that. I don't really have an issue with that. Can't think of many devices that we have in our lives anymore that require a 12 volt auxiliary socket. Moving on to storage, where are you going to put your phone? Well, it neatly lives in there, you've also got your wireless phone charger and just next to it you have another little slot as well. Then bottle storage, I like that, easily fits a bottle of virtually any size, it's got teeth on the side, if you jump over to the door pockets you have a bin there for the bottle and also storage alongside it. Centre console you have a generous storage space there, I'll give you an idea of how deep that is, plus a little tray and finally you have this, the glove box, plenty of room for the manual and your water bottle. In terms of comfort you have dual zone climate control, heated and cooled seats plus heated steering wheel, you have a litany of seat adjustments here in terms of electric control and on top of that they are nappa leather seats so that is high end stuff, I like the way they're designed as well with these perforations really nicely comfort wise they feel good, they are a little bit firm but for the most part they feel nice they don't really hug me in too much they feel like they're built for slightly bigger people steering wheel sits nicely in the hand and the paddle shifter is stuck behind there as well I'm surprised by the amount of leg room I have plenty of knee room loads of toe room and head room is a little bit cramped but OK for someone my height there are a lot of highlights here to talk about you can adjust the passenger seat forwards and backwards as required clever placement for two USB ports plus an additional USB port down the bottom and a 12 volt outlet over on the doors you have these shades that come up like that more of that sort of cool textured material in the doors there you have heated seats activated by using the switch on the door we have a center armrest with two bottle holders they fit easily inside the door you have a bottle holder up the top but then an additional one down the bottom so they really have thought about everything here in terms of making it comfortable if you need more room in the second row you can move the second row forwards and backwards you have points on the two out board seats all three rows have points on the third row making this an SUV that can have baby seats all the way in the back there speaking of which third row can you fit adults in a kid only zone they have developed a clever system to give you access to the third row you can push this button down here or the same button up the top slide everything forward pull the seats up from the boot using this lever they lock into place and you climb in which is an awkward task for me to do but I can do it for you I have the technology vehicle let's talk cargo space often with these three row SUV's you don't have much room here you have just under 200 litres of cargo space. We'll try our luggage in a sec, but under here you can store your cargo blind, which is a really good feature. You have some netting, the jack for the full-size spare tyre, and a little bit of spare space there to keep your belongings away from prying eyes. Let's see how we go. So laptop bag fits in fine. We'll see if it fits our suitcase. It does, but will it close? That is the ultimate test. Let's see, fingers crossed. No, it's not going to close. That's okay. So you cannot fit luggage in there behind the third row, but you probably could fit shopping and stuff like that. What happens when you drop the third row? Well, you have just over 600 litres of cargo space, and we can quite easily then fit everything in, which is easily done. And then finally, if you drop the second row, which is done using these buttons just here, you have a little over 2000 litres of cargo space. Yes, I know, keep mentioning this. They're both on the same platform, but you will notice a few minute differences there in things like USB placement. But for the most part, they are pretty similar. Where they both stumble a little bit, though, is not having airbag coverage for the third row. It sort of covers half the window. And look, for the most part, you're going to be fine, but it really is disappointing that they haven't gone to that extra length to actually fit airbags that cover the entire side length of that car, inclusive of the third row, especially if you've got little ones in the back there. So arguably, the most important part about these cars is driving them. So let's hit the road and see how they both fare. All right, we're on the road now in the Santa Fe, and powering this is a 2.2-litre turbocharged four-cylinder diesel engine. It makes 148 kilowatts of power and 440 newton-metres of torque, and that's made it to an eight-speed dual-clutch transmission. Now, what's the gearbox like? You know, I'm not a huge fan of dual-clutch transmissions. This one's not terrible. Let me just have a little look-see here from standing start. Yeah, it's okay. Feels very much like the Sorento, where it's just fairly, I don't know, fuss-free and not too sort of laggy or not too sort of elastic like a lot of dual-clutch gearboxes are. This one's actually quite good. And if we give it a punch, yeah, it's quite responsive there. It's ready to sort of get up and go, and it's never really in a dead spot. It's leaning on that torque band. In fact, this engine is super eager. Find that it's always just ready to punch you in the back, and in fact, it feels a little more eager than the Sorento. So I'd be interested to see whether they have a different tune on this compared to the Sorento. Let's talk fuel economy. So Hyundai claims a combined 6.1 litres per 100km. We're currently consuming 8.4, which is near enough. That's pretty decent, given that we've been doing low-speed driving. So I think that's a commendable figure for a car this size. You've got to remember that these are getting bigger and bigger with all the systems they're putting into them. So that's a good number to have for a seven-seat SUV. You can get the Santa Fe in both all-wheel drive and front-wheel drive. This one here is the all-wheel drive model, and it uses a system called H-TRAC, which is effectively a permanent all-wheel drive setup. So I'll flick over to our all-wheel drive menu here. You can see right now in smart mode, it's sending torque to both the front and the rear. So depending on which setting you have it in and what the computer thinks it should be doing, it will then shuffle torque between the front and rear axles. Now, speaking of drive modes, I've got a few to pick from here. So smart, sport, eco and comfort. Each of those will vary the amount of torque split between the front and rear axle and how it deals with that. And then as you flick between them, you can see the menus change there ahead of the driver, which I think is pretty cool. Very sharp-looking setup. I quite like the sport mode. So it adds weight to the steering, and it makes the gearbox really sharp and quick. It's surprisingly sort of punchy when you sort of get stuck into the throttle. So that's really impressive. You're not going to be doing any real off-roading in this. You do have a couple of off-road drive modes to choose from. Snow, mud and sand. But with a ground clearance of 176 mil, it's not really enough to get you anywhere. Yeah, and it doesn't offer an official zero to 100 time, but we thought we'd put it up against our stopwatch anyway. Okay, we'll go back to smart mode here. Let's talk about the ride. So this has an Australian ride and handling tune, and I've got to say it is really impressive. We're out here on a country road doing 80 k's an hour. It just soaks up everything really nicely. So it's just on the sportier side of comfortable. So you do feel it sort of moving around as you hit bumps and that kind of thing. But it's incredibly compliant, and just the way that it soaks everything up on 20-inch alloy wheels, I think just shows you how much effort they've put into tuning it for Australian road conditions. Let's talk handling. Slot this over to sport mode. I really do like how sharp that throttle becomes. Okay, yes, I know this is no sports car, that's actually pretty fun. Yeah, it's got some urge. Like it sits fairly flat. The steering's nice and responsive. You get a bit of feel through the wheel as well, and then you can just punch it out of a corner. So yeah, thumbs up handling. In terms of cabin noise and wind noise, there isn't a great deal of wind noise that I'm noticing here on this country road, and there isn't a great deal of tyre noise coming into the cabin. You do hear it roaring a little bit over coarse chip sections, but for the most part, it's a pretty quiet place to be seated. Now let's talk visibility. So at the front there, it's excellent. At the rear, it's pretty good. The wing mirrors are big as well, and you have the blind spot monitor built into them too. And when you put the indicator on, you get the little blind spot camera come on on either side of that cluster, which I think is just such a fantastic feature. Really helps you when it comes to driving in and around the city around cyclists and also with parking. Finally, turning circle, 11.4 metres. So it's not a terrible turning circle, but it's not the tightest in the world either, but it should be okay for driving in and around the city and doing U-turns and that kind of thing. We've just hit the road in the Sorento, and let me run through the drivetrain under the bonnet here. So 2.2-litre turbocharged, four-cylinder diesel engine, makes 148 kilowatts of power and 440 newton metres of torque. So not a big step forward over the last generation, but that's not such a bad thing because the engine itself was always fine to begin with. What they have changed though is the gearbox. It now uses an eight-speed dual clutch. It's a wet clutch. This is a brand new gearbox to Hyundai and Kia, and it's been developed with performance applications in mind. So slightly varied version of this is going to find its way into the new Hyundai i30N with DCT. So we can just see how it goes in a performance application. Here though, not a huge, huge fan of it. So as we slow down, it can be a little bit fussy at low speeds. So it kind of lurches forward and it's not overly responsive until you get stuck into it. And then it kind of just gives you everything. And then on hills as well, it can be a little bit funny too. So look, it is a big improvement, but I think there's probably still a tiny bit of work to be done to it. When you do opt for the diesel in the GT line, it's an all-wheel drive system. And there's actually a clever display ahead of the driver that shows you how much torque is going to the front and rear axle. So if I bury this, you'll see it splits that a little more evenly. And that's especially handy if you are going off-road. And I say that because you're not going to be doing any major off-roading, but it is good to know you have that display. If you do opt for the petrol V6, yes, it is a punchier engine, but it is front-wheel drive only. We don't have an official zero to 100 number from Kia, but I thought we'd test it out anyway. So I'm going to pop that into sport mode and let's see what happens. Yeah, look, it feels pretty punchy. The engine itself has never been an issue. And now the gearbox is actually really quite responsive. It doesn't have any torque holes. And if I slow it down a little bit here, and then just give it a little kick. Yeah, it's really fast to respond. I like the way this works once it's moving. Not so great at low speeds, but once it's moving, it's pretty impressive. So speaking of drive modes, there's this little switch here, and it's quite interesting because it goes between smart, which is what we're in now, sport, eco and comfort. But then if you want to go to your four-wheel drive controls, you simply push it and then it allows you to select between snow, mud and sand. And it's in those modes that it's able to activate the hill descent control and also adjust the variability of the stability control to give you greater comfort and traction in those environments. So I like the way that's set up. It's all very easy and straightforward. Let's talk fuel economy. Kia claims an official combined fuel consumption of 6.1 litres per 100 k's. So over the last 100 kilometres, I've been averaging 10 litres per 100 kilometres. So that is significantly more than the claim. And we've been doing a fair bit of highway driving as well. So it's interesting to see the figure is actually that high. Let's talk about the ride. Kia does all of its ride and handling tuning for its cars here in Australia. So this car has a bespoke tune for Australia that is developed for the Australian market. A lot of people ask, why are our roads any different? Are they bad? Are they worse than other roads around the world? Well, no, they're not. But the problem is we have a greater variability of roads. So you need to be able to tune this car for gravel, for bad country roads, for smooth city roads and also for roads with built up gravel on the side. So it is quite a complex requirement for a car to be able to cross all of those measures. And we kind of have a unique environment. And for that reason, they do all of their tuning here for these cars. What does it feel like? Well, it's really interesting because the car has what I would describe as a European feel. Now that sounds a little bit cheesy, but it feels as good as the European competitors in this segment, because the ride quality is fantastic, regardless of which surface you pick. So here we are in a pretty poor country road. And as we cruise over some of these bumps, it's soaking everything up nicely. The damping is nice and progressive and the spring rate is on the firmer side of comfortable, but it doesn't leave you jarred or feeling like this is too sporty. The only time it does struggle a little bit is on cobblestones and low speed stuff around the city, where it can feel a little bit brittle and you are picking up a whole lot of those imperfections. In terms of towing capacity, if you do want to do any towing here, 2000 kilogram brake towing capacity with a 200 kilogram down ball weight. And in terms of noise, it is quiet in the cabin, but we are picking up a little bit of wind noise and the diesel engine can be a little thrashy at the top end of the rev band. On the outside, it is a little bit noisy too. Now let's talk visibility and watch this as I put the indicator on. Check that out. So that is part of the blind spot monitor. Second, you put the indicator on, you get a camera pop up. It works on the left hand side as well. I love this technology because I haven't seen that before on any other car in the Australian market and it works really well. It's a super high resolution screen. And then if I go to indicate and merge into someone while there's someone there, it vibrates the steering wheel as well. So this has you covered regardless of what you're doing and it's great to see them integrate that. And on the visibility front, I can see clearly out the front there. At the back, it's not too bad. It's quite a narrow envelope, but the wing mirrors are really big on the sides. And of course, I've got front and rear parking sensors, so parking is fairly straightforward. So it's driving done and dusted. So these cars both share the same engine, but you'll notice there in the video that the Hyundai was slightly quicker from zero to 100. And it definitely feels that way behind the wheel. It feels sharper and the ride is slightly sportier, but I think I prefer it that way. It really just has an overall resolved feel behind the wheel. And I think that's where the Santa Fe wins out in terms of driving. Yes, the Sereno is still fantastic, but if you compare the two side by side, I think the Santa Fe just sits slightly higher and gives you a better performance behind the wheel. Now, what about the overall verdict? So if you add our sections together and we come up with a winner, I guess with the benefit of hindsight, it probably would have been better to pick two other cars to do a comparison with, given these are the same in a few of those sections. The Santa Fe actually comes out marginally on top, but there is a variable here in the comparison, and this is where you guys can build your own comparison effectively. I want you to go and have a look at the price of these cars in your market and also the warranty. If we look specifically at Australia, the Sorento comes with an extra two years of warranty, and it's also about $3,000 cheaper once you add all the costs together. So for that reason, the Sorento wins our comparison. In your market though, it may be a little bit different, and I am keen to see which one is actually cheaper and which one has the longer warranty in your market. Now, like I said at the start, this is a new format we're trialling, and I'm really keen to get your feedback. Did you enjoy it? Is there something you liked or something you didn't like? Please let us know in the comment section below, because this will help us craft the next iterations of this and help us put together content that you guys enjoy. If you did enjoy this video, make sure you hit the like button and share it with your mates. And if you haven't done so already, subscribe to our channel so you can get all the latest car reviews delivered straight to your YouTube inbox thing. But until next time, take it easy.