The in-house design team from Korea were very excited to introduce the Venue to South Africans, saying that our beautifully diverse and action-packed country served as a source of inspiration. What I want to know is, why didn't they give it a cooler name, then? Like the Hyundai Karoo; or Hyundai Limpopo... I don't know — I suspect something got lost in translation between English and Korean. But anyhow, here it is, and we are pleased as Punch to be welcoming their Asian Venue to our local venue.
Local line-up
The Venue enters the market with five variants:
- The Venue 1.0T Motion, R 274 900;
- The Venue 1.0T Motion Auto, R 304 900;
- The Venue 1.0T Fluid, R 309 900;
- The Venue 1.0T Fluid Auto, R 339 900; and
- The Venue 1.0T Glide Auto, R 369 900.
Styling
The Venue's basic shape is essentially a baby Creta — somewhat square but equally outdoorsy with similar edgy character lines. The Venue's designers went for a trendy, yet robust and powerful look that exudes confidence and personality. I love the split headlamp arrangement (as seen on the Hyundai Kona and latest Santa Fe): the top elements incorporate turn signals while the bottom ones do what headlamps are supposed to do — light the way forward. Only the flagship Glide models have daytime running lamps that surround the entire headlight housing, and its bi-xenon headlamps have a cornering function to illuminate dark corners when the Venue changes direction.
The interesting crisscross grille visually differentiates the 'face' of the Venue from the rest of the Hyundai SUV line-up. Upon seeing the first full-frontal photos on social media, one of our followers commented, “I was wondering where my braai grid went!” Roof rails and 16-inch alloy wheels are standard on the Fluid and Glide variants. Fancy the two-tone look? It's reserved for Glide variants only.
Interior-wise, it's not the most exciting cabin, but I like its minimalist look. Build quality is good, but not quite as solid-feeling as VW's latest heavy-hitting gladiator, the new T-Cross, which has a starting price of R 334 600. This is decidedly less affordable than the Venue's starting price of R 274 900. However, a more budget-orientated manual T-Cross can be expected early in 2020.
Related: The new T-Cross will knock off your socks
Grade walk — Tech and spec
Hyundai aims to lure buyers of different budgets into Hyundai showrooms by offering the most basic Venue, the Motion, with a good amount of comfort and convenience features as well as safety equipment, at a very competitive R 274 900.
I am delighted to see that Hyundai is more concerned with safety features than touch screens. The Motion-derivatives only have a four-speaker sound system (with Bluetooth, streaming capability and 2 USB ports) but do come with ABS, EBD, hill-assist control, and stability control. Two airbags are standard. Air-conditioning is manual and all windows are electric, and there's a central armrest with a convenient storage cubby for smaller items. The Motion models get cloth seats. Rear parking sensors are absent, unfortunately.
In addition to all the above-mentioned features, Fluid models have cruise control and a leather steering wheel, as well as an 8-inch touchscreen (with rear view camera/park distance control display) and Apple CarPlay / Android Auto. It gains two tweeters to supplement the four normal speakers, offers glove box cooling and a sliding front central armrest. Six airbags are standard and seat material is a leather/material combination — but it's more cloth than material.
The flagship Glide model gets all the goodies above, as well as automatic air-con and the aforementioned snazzy headlamp package which also has 30-second delay lighting (also known as follow-me-home headlamps) and front fog lamps. The full list of specifications for the new Venue can be viewed on the Hyundai SA website.
Related: Quick review - the facelifted Hyundai Creta
Space
Hyundai managed to carve out an impressive amount of space inside the Venue, especially for the guys on the rear bench. To get an idea of available rear space, a tall colleague got out of his driver's seat and proceeded to squeeze in behind “himself”, but it turned out to not be a squeeze at all — he had enough room to be more than comfortable. While the central rear seat has only a lap belt, I don't foresee many Venue owners putting three adults or children in the back. As for boot space, there are 350 litres available.
Related: Hyundai Kona - go on, make yourself more interesting
Behind the wheel of the Venue
The launch route had some exceptional driving roads in store for us, including the revered Franschhoek pass which we traversed and descended in the six-speed manual Venue 1.0T GDI Glide. Despite the Venue's 195 mm ground clearance there was very little lean in the corners, and the little SUV seemed genuinely happy going about its business - whether it entailed stopping and starting in traffic, or tearing around the Helshoogte pass. The Venue offers sufficient grip, absorbs road-bumps in its stride, and there's hardly any road- or wind noise.
The refined 88 kW 3-cylinder engine is lovely and lively, and the 7-speed DCT automatic gearbox which we sampled post-lunch is well suited to it. Usually I'm a girl who loves a manual gearbox, but the auto would be my first choice in this instance. Fuel consumption, on average, came down to about 6 litres per 100 km and one can expect around 700 kilometres from one tank of petrol.
Verdict
When the day drew to a close, I found myself feeling like a child who had to part with her favourite new toy. I was having immense fun darting down the N1 back to our hotel while listening to my preferred playlist on Spotify. A car that can make a tedious city commute fun and looks good doing it, is surely worth buying? Then there's the added bonus of Hyundai's 7-year warranty and the fact that their cars just don't break...
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