2021 Kia Carnival Diesel 2.2 SX Tech Pack 7-Seater | sgCarMart Reviews
You know… sitting down here… looking out the sunroof
If it is at night it will be a nice stargazing seat
Why can’t all cars be like that?
Let’s go
Anyway, today we have
the Kia Carnival
and Kia calls this car a “GUV”
or “Grand Utility Vehicle”
I think they are trying to
make this car more SUV-like
Yeah if you look at the first
one and a half meters of the car, it does look like the front of an SUV
but if you look at the rest of the car
you can’t run away from the fact that this is actually an MPV so
it’s just a people mover, but it does look very sporty up front
I think it is a missed opportunity for them to not call this a “GPV”
or “Glorious Purpose Vehicle”
Up front I feel that the Carnival aesthetics is much sportier looking
than your regular MPVs
It is helped by this very aggressive looking front grille
This design is what Kia calls a “Tiger Nose”
but I think here it looks more like a whale
It is huge and it is very wide, and imposing
when you see it in your rear
I like the baton design, it is nice and shiny
and look at the number of lights here – 1…2…3…4…5…6…7…
The DRL is this weird shape here
Yeah I think it’s okay, I was expecting the DRL to also become a turn
turn indicator but it’s not
the turn indicator is just this small little light here
which is a bit weird because the car is so big
and the turn indicator is so small
and here are the headlamps, LED, and if you want to high beam someone
it’s not the headlamps that raise up, it’s actually
this light here, so the high beam comes from here
Very interesting
All in all I think this looks a lot mroe different than your regular MPVs
and I think it’s a good thing, it looks rather sporty
and from the side, as I have mentioned earlier
The front looks SUV-ish, but all that goes out the window
once you look at the rear, it is very MPV-like
In fact from here, it looks like a baller rapper’s car
It’s almost 5.2 meters long
it’s close to 2 meters wide, and it is 1.77 meters tall
This is moved along the road by this very thick 55 profile 19 inch tires
I was quite surprised when I say this car, the wheels look very big and imposing
but it makes the ride really plush down the road
Yes let’s look at the boot now
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and from the rear you can see that Kia has hopped on the bandwagon of putting
an entire strip of tail lights here
and you would think that the turn indicator will probably be here or
this will turn yellow instead of red when you want to signal to change your lanes
but no, the turn indicator is right here – half of this white strip
Just this small space for the turn indicator
You would think that this car being this size would need bigger turn indicators
to tell other people on the road that this whale is going to change lanes
but no it only has this small turn indicator
Yeah that’s weird
For a seven seater, you would think that the boot space is crap
200-300 liters with all the seats up, will you be correct?
No because this is over 620 liters of boot space, look
it passes the Auntie Trolley Height Test Perfectly and you can have your luggage in here
and if can hear this annoying beep, it is actually a good feature
It is alerting you that if you step away for long enough
the boot will close on its own
but if this 627 liters is not good enough for you
You can fold down the seats
for more space
and of course this is not its final form, because if you want even more practical space
you can move the seats down
but the hydraulics
even though there are hydraulics, it is still quite a workout to pull the seats down
but once you do that
loads of storage and loading space, look
Tada… and you can even lie down here
to stargaze at night
Yes
So for the Carnival you have a 7-seater and an 8-seater
We are in the 7-seater variant, which is actually more premium
I’ll explain why later
So for the 7-seater you have two in front, two in the middle row, and three at the back
Amenities – cup holders
a sun shade
and crucially an aircon vent which is
located perfectly because it is blowing right at my face
and as you can tell, loads of legroom
headroom is also great
Yeah it is pretty comfortable for one adult sitting back here
but can you seat three full sized adults?
I would say it will be a squeeze, you see from the shoulder room
but for the butt space I think is okay
Leg space there will still be enough space for three adults but I would
assume that will be three kids
and there are also ISOFIX points on each side
So you can have two baby chairs here and definitely
then you won’t have an adult here
but it is comfortable, yeah so let’s check out the middle row
and the middle row is the reason why you get
the Carnival in the 7-seater configuration
because you get two captain style chairs with arm rests and individual seats
This I call the “towkay seat” because this is where your VVIP will sit
They will alight into the safety of a pavement
rather than this seat where you alight into traffic
and the “towkay” feature is because
if you feel that the front passenger is not giving you enough legroom
you can actually adjust
the front passenger seat through the buttons at the side here
Yes, the “towkay” can do that
and the seats can be adjusted backwards and forwards
and as you can see this is the most forward position
I still get so much legroom, a lot of headroom
and there is an aircon vent here
with climate control and it is positioned perfectly
right down my face, I love it
A manual sun shade to block out all the sun
and most crucially, ventilated and heated seats
Ventilated seats in this seat is just heaven
You want to be the passenger sitting in the middle row of the Carnival
You don’t want to be the guy who buys this car
and then ferries his wife and mother-in-law around all day
but maybe if you have a happy wife, you have a happy life yeah
To the front seat
So Kia have been known to give good equipment levels and
a relatively luxurious feeling cabin for the money that you pay
It is kind of the same for the Kia Carnival when you first get in
First impressions, this car is quite majestic feeling
Feels, looks expensive
but if you are really detailed oriented, and you go down to it
there’s a lot of clickity clackity plastics that
sort of takes away the feeling of refinement
and feeling that this car is expensive but it is not
Okay for the price that you pay it is actually a lot of car
In terms of equipment
there is a very big infotainment system here that has
Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, although it is not connected wirelessly
but when you connect your phone via a wire, it sets up Apple CarPlay immediately
So that is very good and convenient to use
Moving down, one thing about the aircon vents
This is a big car but the aircon vents are miniscule
I had a hard time trying to direct the air into my face
Yeah I don’t know what’s with this trend of newer cars having
such small aircon vents
Moving down, there is this touch sensitive panel to
to go through the options in your car
I don’t like it because
there’s not tactile feel to it and there’s no haptic feedback
so you don’t know whether you’ve pressed it
Moving down the aircon controls are kind of a mixed bag
You get a physical lever to adjust the temperature
but again the same touch sensitive panel to adjust your fan speed
which is quite finicky if you are trying to drive and adjust the fan speed
Moving down, great stuff, wireless charging pad
and USB ports, and this car has Auto Hold – very important
and this gear lever which I like
I think I mentioned in the Kia Seltos review that this gear lever just feels
very good to rest your hand on, I don’t know why
but I appreciate this gear lever
and here you have ventilated seats, good stuff
This car is 5.2m long and 1.995m wide so
it is quite intimidating for some drivers but fret not
you have 360 cameras so you can see
everything that is happening in front of you and at the back of you
so no worries there for
drivers who are not confident, this car will set you up nicely
Kia calls this a “GUV” so you expect the driving experience to be very sporty
but I must say the steering wheel just feels very
MPV-ish, very uncle-like
Nothing bad with that, the controls are easy to understand
The buttons here on the right controls the instrument cluster
and also your adaptive cruise control
On the left is your infotainment buttons
Everything very simple to understand, easy to use
The steering wheel feels nice to the touch
You get electronic seats, memory seats and they are comfortable
All in all this is a very comfortable cabin to be in
There is a BOSE sound system, and it sounds very good
It will mask out all the clickity clackity plastic
I can’t even say it out properly…
Yeah it’s just very plastic
Okay let’s see how this thing drives, let’s go
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So what is it like driving the Kia Carnival
Some performance figures first, up front is
a 2.2 liter diesel engine that produces 198 bhp and 440 Nm of torque
Well you definitely need the 440 Nm because this car is 2.2 tonnes
So it does feel quite
big and heavy on the road, and speaking of big and heavy
I guess driving this car would intimidate
quite a lot of people but I think the safety assistance features
of this car helps a lot
For example, there is adaptive cruise control which makes driving very relaxing
but more importantly there is lane keep assist
and steer assist, what steer assist is
the car essentially kind of helps you stay in the lane
I can feel the steering wheel really directing me
to keep lane discipline so that is very useful
and there are a lot of other safety assistance features, like front cross traffic alert
when there is a little kid that is about to run in front of you
and you can’t see him because he is too short and this is a very tall car
the car will alert you and there is a camera up front
will show you that there is someone walking across in front
and of course there is blind spot monitoring which
works well especially with such a big car
There is quite a prominent blind spot so the blind spot monitoring works well
In terms of driving comfort
this is an MPV, even though Kia calls it a “GUV”
it feels nothing like an SUV, this is a big minivan
and it drives like one, the steering is very light and it is good because
when it is light, it is easy to steer
but when it is light it is not very communicative as well so it is vague
but it is not something you are looking for in an MPV anyway, you are not going to
do a lot of weaving in and out of traffic in this huge beast
So it is actually very relaxing coupled with the ventilated seats
Driving is extremely relaxing, turn on steer assist
turn on adaptive cruise control and driving on the highway
up to Genting will be very comfortable
and 440 Nm of torque means that you can go up the Genting slope easily
So is the Kia Carnival a Will Buy, Won’t Buy, or Go Try?
For me it is a Go Try
At $209,000 it is kind of in its own territory because
the Toyota Vellfire which is in the same class size is $240,000
and the other kind of competitor to this is the Honda Odyssey
and that is $170,000 – $180,000, it is on it’s own and
It is absolutely comfortable to drive, the driver assistance features are great
If you are coming from the perspective of
a family man buying a car for the space, that’s when
I would pause a while and think
do I buy this car, or the slightly smaller cars like the
Serena e-POWER, which is $140,000
both can still carry seven passengers in comfort
It will not be as luxurious as this, you know the ventilated seats
and the relaxation modes
but if you are just someone hunting for people carrying capability
the smaller sized MPVs do the job well
but if you are buying it for absolute enjoyment and people carrying capabilities
and maybe flexing to your neighbours, you got a bigger MPV
and you can carry your in-laws in more style and luxury
Then this is it yes
So for me it is a Go Try
There you have it, my review of the Kia Carnival
Do you agree, disagree – let me know in the comments below
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