Hyundai Ioniq 5

However much all-electric motoring threatens dire deprivation for most of the traditional motoring senses, I‘d always held out a somewhat vainglorious hope that a commensurate relaxation of engineering hard points might simultaneously elicit a deal of newfound stylistic bombast. On current showing, however, Fat Chance.

But why? Why must an electric car so studiously ape what we know and will shortly be forced to no longer love? And even if the powers that clearly shouldn’t be have determined that we won’t be happy unless the silhouette remains doggedly familiar, shouldn’t the presentation at least try to sing the body electric just a tad louder?

Happily, in this latter department, Hyundai has firmly stepped up to the plate. The Ioniq 5’s fantastic, origami-sharp-creased architecture combines perfectly with properly novel, pixelated light signatures front and rear, and the silver front fascia panel disguises further illuminatory flair which it only reveals after dark.

Best of all, though -and adding further confusion to Father Ted’s argument to Dougal that ‘these are small, and those out there are far away’, so finely wrought are the car’s proportions that it’s actually a much bigger machine than photographs or live viewing from afar would suggest -SUV masquerading as hatchback. And I genuinely can’t remember the last time that struck me about a car…

The show continues with flush-mounted door handles easing, unsolicited from the bodywork as you approach… But any sense of visual snap ends there. Because, by contrast to that fabulous couture, the interior is incohesive, somewhat bland and not in the least adventurous.

Worst offender is a sliding centre console that’s just an ugly cupholder blob, and a central bin hanging under the dashboard like the mouth of a phenomenally surprised cartoon character isn’t much better. These two ungainly elements don’t meet; the only advantage to which is that the flat floor makes access to the driver’s seat from the front passenger door much easier when some I-don’t-give-a-toss-about-anyone-else Range Rover parks so close you can’t use the driver’s door…

Instrumentation takes the increasingly electro-ubiquitous form of two screens set in a glossy, pizza chef’s paddle, but there’s sufficient ancillary switchgear to ensure you won’t have to endure a touch-screen stab-fest every time you need to change anything at all. Unfortunately, that doesn’t include the lane keeping assistant, which is stupendously intrusive -aggressively re-aiming on your behalf, even mid-lane on a wide A road- and hopelessly complex to switch off. Every. Time. You. Climb. Aboard.

This isn’t the best thought out multimedia screen either. Dial up the map and there’s no home page icon available to take you back to the menus (cue frantic, hit ‘n’ hope stabbing at screen corners) and the twin screens themselves may only be portrayed on a choice of black or white backgrounds. White looks ghastly.

The driving position gives no cause for complaint. Though surprisingly thin, the front seats are artfully padded to give snug yet comfortable hold in every department, the steering wheel offers plenty of reach and rake adjustment, and the view out is splendid. The sliding rear bench offers acres of space astern, questioning the need to put the driver’s seat on a diet, and a reasonable, though shallowish, loadspace aft is supplemented by a 57 litre frunk.

The Ioniq 5 is available with a choice of standard- or long-range batteries and rear- or all-wheel drive. The version I drove combines the larger battery with rear-wheel drive, and is clever enough to cope with both 400 and 800 volt charging. This means that, using the fastest available 350kW chargers, it will inhale electricity at sufficient speed to take you from 10 to 80% charge in just 18 minutes.

Not on my drive, it won’t; no three-pin plug on the end of the cable means no charging at all… Mercifully, a 280 mile range on 20” wheels is more than enough for my working week.

As ever, that which hallmarks an all-electric drive is quiet, smooth power delivery allied to ever-surprising lashings of acceleration. But that which invariably separates the men from the boys is how the car deals with the not inconsiderable weight of its batteries; the Ioniq 5 weighs in at nearly two tonnes…

Here the Hyundai steers a fine line between performance and waft. It’s decidedly not a performance oriented machine and, despite being pleasingly brisk from the off, will start to run out of respectable oomph as you near 80mph or so. Nor, despite sharp, accurate, well-weighted steering, and reliable, solid-feeling brakes that don’t mess you about when you adjust the level of regeneration, is the emphasis on rubbing the door handles off through corners.

Rather, the suspension has been nicely tuned to combine admirable cornering credentials with enough body roll to remind you that this is a respectably sized, and weighty, SUV, not the nippy hatchback it resembles. As a result, ride quality largely lacks the brittle feel all too prevalent in heavy EVs forced to handle, and most bumps are absorbed with little fuss. Lob in acceptable levels of tyre and wind noise, and Hyundai has, it strikes me, got the undercarriage pretty well sorted.

Always a pleasure to look at, and largely a doddle to live with (once you’ve dismembered the lane keeper), the Ioniq 5 conjured only three quibbles; firstly, the price -same as it ever was for any EV; secondly, the interior -a quantum leap behind the couture; and, thirdly, the lack of recharging infrastructure in Mudfordshire -which is hardly its fault.