2022 Kia K5 EX: TEST DRIVE+FULL REVIEW

Hey guys, Will here with WTF Car Reviews and today we're going to be reviewing this all-new 2022 Kia K5 EX. And huge thanks to Darius and the rest of the management and staff here at Regal Kia in Lakeland, Florida for making this review possible. These guys are awesome, I'll leave a link to their inventory below and if you're in Florida looking for a new car, I would definitely suggest checking these guys out and ask for Darius. And for those of you guys who don't know, the K5 took over the Optima platform for the 2021 model year for the fifth generation. The Optima was around since the year 2000, that's when the first generation was released. But here for 2022 for the K5, here's the EX trim. It's going to be the top of the line when it comes to luxury and features. We do have the GT trim which we have reviewed in this channel. It's going to be a little bit more expensive because it's going to have an upgraded engine, but as far as luxury and features and tech, this is going to be the top of the line Kia K5. Starting with the base price around $28,000, let's see what we get. So coming right up front, we're going to notice our full LED headlights with an orange daytime running strip, definitely unique. You can see them labeled DRL LED to the sides. The housing itself is going to be all blacked out, matching really nicely with this blacked out grille. The lights are going to have some aluminum contrast, making them look much more shiny and flashy, which is cool for some lights. The high and low beam are all going to be LEDs. As far as the grille, we are going to get the updated Kia logo. The grille itself, very solid opening for this radiator and intercooler to the side. Up front, more airflow down here as well, and we are going to have some functional air curtains here too. That's a nice touch for this K5 EX. But we'll take a step back and take a look at the front styling one more time. The paint is extremely dirty, should have probably ran it through a wash, but not a big deal. Hopefully you guys can still pick up this exterior styling. As far as this wheel and tire setup, also really impressive here, we're going to have our 18-inch rims wrapped in 235-45 R18s. The tires are going to be for LEP Zero all-season tires, some of the best all-seasons in the business, and I'm liking these 18-inch rims with the silver and gunmetal gray contrast for the new style Kia center cap. No plastic cladding outside the wheel well, definitely keeping it looking very sleek and aggressive. Continuing along, as far as the mirror, we're not going to have an LED strip on the mirror itself, but it is going to be contrasted with this blue and black contrast. The glass itself fills up the frame very well. We have blind spot monitoring, window trim for the bottom parts, and be all blacked out, blacked out B-pillar with some chrome running right up top. Smart access for the driver and front passenger, it's a nice touch. As far as this window sticker, we're not going to have any tints back here, so it should be pretty easy to see. Here we have our 2022 Kia K5 EX. We get the sapphire blue metallic exterior color with the black interior. Every Kia K5, starting with the base models, include the 1.6-liter turbo four eight-speed auto transmission, drive mode select. The advanced safety features include forward collision avoidance assist for the pedestrian warning, lane keeping assist, lane follow assist, driver attention warning, high beam assist, leading vehicle departure warning, blind spot, rear cross traffic collision avoidance, and safe exit assist. Airbag assist, you guys can pause, take a look at all the safety features here. As far as the interior comfort and convenience, we get the eight-inch touchscreen with Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, rear-view camera, dynamic guidelines. You can pause, take a look at all the standard features on the base K5. Every K5 includes LED reflector headlights with auto on and off, amber LED daytime running lamps as well. Power heated outside mirrors are standard. Acoustic front windshield, also standard, as well as 16-inch alloy wheels, no hubcaps on your even base LXS K5. This is the EX front wheel drive. It's going to be the top-of-the-line front wheel drive Kia K5, outside of the GT, of course. We're going to get the 18-inch machine-finished alloy wheels, panoramic sunroof with power sunshade. We'll see up top, you can see the black and blue contrast. You get the parking distance warning for the reverse, 10.25-inch touchscreen with navigation, Syntec seating materials, and LED interior lighting, leather-wrapped steering wheel, power driver's seat with power lumbar, heated ventilator front seats, wireless phone charger, and rear air vents. Auto up-down for the front passenger as well. Additional equipment includes carpeted floor mats for $155, total vehicle price sitting at $28,745 before $1,000 destination charge. Total price is going to be sitting a tick below $30,000. Pretty great value, considering the luxury and features this vehicle includes. Fuel economy will be 31 combined, 27 city, 37 highway. So, it's even pretty good on gas, pretty good value overall. No smart access out rear, wouldn't really be expected. Gas tank, it's going to be pushed to open, no easy fill, and you can put 87 into this car, but 91 octane is recommended for the turbocharged engine. As far as this chrome trim for the upper part of the window trim, it's going to flushly flow all the way out for your trunk. You really don't see that very often, and even this black trim is still going to be a part of your trunk lid. Out rear, LED taillights, turn signals, reverse lights, shout out Regal Kia in Lakeland, Florida. Get the K5 badge. Over here, I like the jagged edges for the K, it does look pretty unique. Updated Kia badge, the light pattern continues for the center part of the trunk lid, rear view camera, parking sensors out rear. No real exhaust tips, that's a knock I guess, but we're going to have a pretty aggressive diffuser, and your exhaust tips are still going to be located, well exhaust tip is going to be located right down over here, but that's about it guys. We'll take a step back, you can take a look at the rear styling one more time, and let's rev it up a little bit and hear how this 2022 Kia K5 EX sounds. All right guys, that was of course the sound of the 1.6 liter turbo four-cylinder sold by Kia for this 2022 Kia K5 EX front-wheel drive, and huge thumbs up that we got struts. Really was not expecting that, not a lot of vehicles in the segment offer struts, but here you have it. Here's your 1.6 liter turbo making 180 horsepower and 195 pound-feet of torque, enough to get this 3,300 pound sedan to 60 in around seven seconds, maybe even a little bit quicker depending on your traction, so pretty quick car considering the segment, considering the price tag, especially considering the features which we'll check out in one second, but that's about it guys. We'll shut this hood right over here, you can take a look at your front styling, definitely love those daytime warning lights, you really don't see anything like that in the segment, but as far as the interior, we'll take a step over here and really check it out, and again we're gonna get smart access for the driver and the front passenger, up top everything's gonna be super soft, we get this wood grain trim underneath, aluminum beneath it, stitched leatherette material, the very soft arm rest too, massive storage compartment, power one touch for the driver and the front passenger, power windows for the rear, really like the design for these controls too, four-way adjustable mirrors, piano black over here, we get one of our speakers beneath it, pretty large storage, you're not going to fit a cup here, well you might fit a cup right here, but it's going to be diagonal and you're probably going to spill it if it's not closed. Stepping inside, we have a K5 badge stepping in, but it's not going to be aluminum or aluminized, so you're probably not going to notice it very frequently. As far as the seats, they're going to be Syntex, but could have fooled me, very high quality seating material, perforated, which lets the heated and cool function work even better, headrest, pretty soft, not the softest, but more than soft enough, the seats themselves, pretty impressive, they're gonna have two-way lumbar control, you can lift them, drop them, slide them, recline them over here. Stepping inside, we'll really check out this interior. The first thing we notice is going to be the steering wheel, it's gonna be pretty thick, pretty surprisingly thick, very solid 10-in-2 bolstering notch, making the 10-in-2 very comfortable to hold, 9-in-3 just about perfect, great thumb slot, great finger slots for the back of the steering wheel, not gonna be a flat bottom, but still very high quality leather steering wheel, aluminum frame, rubberized horn, as far as the horn itself, pretty aggressive, not quite as aggressive as the Forte, I would actually expect it to be more aggressive, but the Forte did sound a little bit louder. The steering wheel controls include voice commands, you got the mode between the AM, FM, and Sirius, volume adjustment, skip your songs, phone settings, aluminums and outline, all these controls, you can adjust the little heads-up cluster, cruise control information, active steering beneath, these dials will adjust both your cruise control and your infotainment screen up front, and you can pause and go back right here. But as far as this infotainment screen, let's see what we have, so we have fuel economy, we can also adjust between accumulated info, drive info, and drive mode, we have economy, normal, and dynamic, we'll adjust between normal and dynamic for the purpose of this review, we also get a compass with turn-by-turn navigation, attention level, and your advanced safety features, we also have a digital speedo, I'll probably leave it for the purpose of this review in the digital speedo, probably my favorite to just look at at all times, and that's about it. We also have a beneath it, we have a 160 mile an hour speedometer with a gas gauge beneath that, as far as the infotainment display, we have the gear that we're currently in to the top left, how many miles are left in the tank, temperature outside, and miles on the vehicle in the corner. As far as these turn signal stocks, really, really satisfying click, one of the more satisfying clicks in the business, we have auto headlamps, we have auto high beams too, we're not gonna have rain sensing wipers, that would be nice to have on the EX top of the line trim, but you can still adjust this stock and make the wipers faster when the rain gets more aggressive. To the left of the steering wheel, we have our interior lighting controls, lane keep assist, traction control settings, and we can pop our trunk with this button down here, we can pop our hood with that latch beneath it, we can adjust the tilt and telescope with this latch right here. That wood trim with aluminum beneath it continues all throughout this interior, even above the steering wheel column, very, very impressive touch for this interior. For this area, it's gonna be some hard plastic, but this area up top is gonna have some rubberized texture. For the passenger, what they'll be looking at, we're gonna have some stitched material up here with some more of that wood trim. We have some piano black trim beneath this leatherette and wooden material, more aluminum beneath the wood, and some soft touch material above your glove box. The air vents are gonna be outlined in that same aluminum engine start, stop button, also aluminum hazards in the middle, dual zone automatic climate control, we get a 12-volt and two USB ports, no wireless charger over here, the wireless charger is gonna be right down here, you're gonna put your phone in this little slot, not quite sure if you guys can pick it up on camera, we get cooled and heated seats, drive mode select, we can adjust between smart, normal, sport, and custom, so we'll start off in normal, then transition into sport, and see what the overall differences are. But over here, we also have auto hold for this parking brake, as far as this gear selector for the eight-speed automatic transmission, we can drop it into reverse, and a pretty high-resolution backup camera, one of the best resolutions I've seen from Kia so far, via guidance lines and trajectory, as well as parking sensors, for a vehicle starting under $30,000, pretty impressive. We also have manual shift controls, we're not gonna have any paddle shifters, unfortunately, we try to move these manuals out of the way, but we have manual shift controls over here, they're not gonna be in the proper direction, it's upshift, you push forward to downshift, you pull back, but not a big deal, we'll check those out for this review once we take it out for a drive. And as soon as you put it back into park, the infotainment screen goes right back into its original setting, and speaking of infotainment screen, let's check it out. So as far as the map, we also get navigation in this vehicle, the map itself, one of the more high-resolution screens, not quite sure if it's loaded up, it is super responsive, as you see, it's basically like an iPad, really, really impressive, and I like how it integrates with this infotainment display up front, it does kind of stick up, compared to the dashboard, but at least they tried to integrate it pretty well with the gauge cluster itself, kind of similar to the GTI setup for 2022, but you can pop out of this map by pressing this home button, we can also take a look at things such as the phone, phone projection, voice memo, climate, HD radio, radio, media, sounds of nature, uber and setup, to the right we also have notifications and the user's manual, as far as the setup settings, you can just scroll through them, right over here we have vehicle setup, navigation, sound, so travel base and whatnot, display, screen theme button, uber general, device connections, user profile, and voice recognition, so that makes it much more usable for the person who ends up buying this vehicle, I'm not going to adjust any of these settings myself, whoever ends up buying this vehicle can adjust it to their own liking, but these are all the settings that you could potentially adjust, my personal favorite is just to look at the map at all times, so we'll leave it here, we can also have some shortcuts to the sides, if you don't want to be going through the touchscreen for all that information, back here, we mentioned the wireless charger, we also have a leather wrapped armrest, very, very comfortable armrest, look at the space, absolutely massive when it comes to space, you're probably fitting anywhere between 9 and 10 16 ounce cans in here, with no issues whatsoever, very good depth, and you have an additional usb port right back over here, we can shut this thing up, as far as the glove box, also very large glove box, you're going to see it's damped, you can probably fit anywhere between 15 to 20 license plates in here, you'll have no problem putting a pair of shoes, you can shut this thing up, up top, no auto dimming rear view mirror, that would actually be kind of expected for this EX trim, but not a big deal, you can simply dim it yourself right here, you have a very good view out of your rear glass, we do get the panoramic moonroof, so you press this button one time, and the shade opens up really quickly, that's actually the quickest opening shade I've ever seen in the business, you double click it, and moonroof itself opens right up, and let's see if it opens up any further, that's as far as it goes, so it doesn't really open up very far, but the glass itself, really massive, we can poke our way out of here, it's sunny and 70 today in Lakeland Florida, absolutely gorgeous day, we can shut this thing right back up, the shade closes with it, pretty cool, but we'll leave the shade open when we hop out back, it should give you guys a good idea of what this cabin looks like, but that's about it for the front seat, let's check out the back real quick and see how much space is offered back there, as well as the overall quality of the materials, all right guys, stepping in the back seat of the 2022 Kia K5 EX, up top, we're gonna get some hard plastic material, but that's to be expected, kind of consistent with this segment, we're gonna get that grained wood material underneath those sill too, we're gonna have a very good weight-resistant aluminum door handle, beneath that, we have some soft touch material, stitched material for the, where your arm will often rest, very soft armrest, solid little storage compartment, no power one touch, but of course, a little power window, I like this jagged design too, for this trim, beneath that, not the most space, you're probably not gonna fit a cup, if anything, you might fit a 12-bounce diagonally, but it's gonna be sideways, so make sure it's tightly closed, you're gonna be spilling a lot of stuff, additional speaker, another K5 nameplate, but again, it's not gonna be outlined in aluminum, so it's pretty tough to notice, as far as the seats, the padding goes all the way out to the armrest, or the door frame, very good bolstering supports too, for a back seat, same for the bottom, it's gonna be perforated leather, it's not gonna be heated or cooled, wouldn't really be expected, but it's still nice to have perforated leather in the back seat, as far as the space, I'm six feet tall, sitting behind my seat settings, and as you can see, I have a ton of space, even more than I did in the Forte, easily five, six inches of legroom, we get two cargo nets, map pockets behind both front seats, air vents, two USBs, aluminum outside the air vents, that's also a nice touch, as far as the center cubby, no string, so you really got to jab your hand inside of it, but pretty soft itself, not the softest back seat center cubby, you have a pass-through for the cup holders, you could drop your phone in there, cup holders are not rubberized, but they should still do more than enough for a 12-ounce can or bottle, we can shut this thing up, you can take a look at the cabin from the back seat with that moonroof shade open, absolutely gorgeous, but that's about it for the back seat guys, hope you get a good sense on this 2022 K5 EX, let's check out the trunk real quick, and take this car out for a drive, all right guys, stepping into the trunk on this 2022 K5, as you see, the hinges are not going to be covered, so if you pack anything up higher than this, it's going to crush your cargo, but I'm loving how this trunk caves in at least like six, seven inches, so your stuff's not going to be flying around as much, the wheel well and the trunk ending is pretty far apart, so you can fit an absolutely massive golf bag with no issues, and really deep trunk, I'm not even remotely close to touching the back seats, if you fold those seats down, I would expect you to fit anywhere between a 50 and a 60 inch TV, you're probably not going to fit much larger than that, because as you see, we are going to have a pretty tight opening for the rear seat opening, but the trunk itself really large, I would expect you to fit at least like six golf bags with no problems whatsoever, we can shut this trunk right here, take one more step back, take a look at the rear styling, and let's take this 2022 K5 EX out for a drive, all right guys, now we've just about seen everything we need to see with the inside and outside of this all-new 2022 Kia K5 EX, let's take it out for a drive, and really see what we got, the first thing I noticed is the steering wheel, this leather steering wheel has a really premium feel in your hands, and the 10-inch ball spring notches really stick out quite a bit, but as soon as we get an opening on this road, we'll see how this vehicle can accelerate, all right guys, taking a step out here, we immediately get a red light, so it should give us a good opportunity to see how this vehicle will accelerate off the line, so I'll catch back with you in one more second, all right guys, trying to get a good launch off the line, oh, the traction control kicks in, yeah, so the boost was limited in first gear because of the traction control, so that's not going to be a good way to really see how this vehicle accelerates off the line, so at some point in this review, I'll try to get a better launch and see what this vehicle really got, but just cruising along this highway, really quiet, you don't hear a lot of wind noise or road noise, I'm going to check these windows, they might be dual-pane, they're not dual-pane, but still, excellent job limiting the wind noise and road noise, that's got to be from the acoustic windshield on this K5 EX, all right guys, stepping out into this road over here, we have a set of train tracks, should give us a good opportunity to see this vehicle's real sound isolation, wow, stays pretty quiet, lean into a little bit, boost kicks in, acceleration is really, really strong, throwing it in, sharp, pretty flat handling, yeah, not a lot to the wheel, the wheel doesn't feel very heavy, at least in normal mode, we'll check it out in sport in one second, but the steering is still super direct and the ride feels very sporty, all right guys, we got a little open road right here, should give us a good opportunity to see what this vehicle has off the line, we'll throw it into sport and come to a complete stop, we'll try to get a good launch this time, so we could really see what this vehicle has off the line and let's go, wow, really strong motor, we got the low fuel warning just now, so we'll head over to a gas station, but on the brakes, throwing it in, wow, steering feels a lot better in sport, on the gas, once that boost kicks in, it really pulls, on the brakes, throwing it in, yeah, sport really helps the steering quite a bit and that boost really helps this engine when it comes to making power, but as you see in sport mode, we are going to be holding revs quite a bit, at least when we're driving a little bit spiritedly, stepping out into this road, regular acceleration, still in sport mode, yeah, much more sensitive, yeah, we're going to like 2500, I feel like we do not need to, we'll leave it in sport for now, we'll turn around in one second and then try out this vehicle's manual shift controls, but on this pretty rough road, we hear a little bit of tire noise, but they really isolate you very well with this 2022 K5 EX, all right guys, we'll try out these manual shift controls, starting off in first gear, we're not going to punch it in first gear, second gear, on the gas, and it short shifts you, as soon as you cross 5600, it automatically shifts you into third, rev match downshifts, kind of slow though, good cornering coming out, not the fastest shifts guys, and we're in a school zone, so our fun's just about over, we'll throw it right back into normal mode, but hope you guys got the point, the shifts are pretty slow, the Kia Forte that we just reviewed on this channel with the CVT transmission, and the similar gear selector with the manual shift controls, I feel like it shifted quicker, but obviously those are simulated gear ratios, these are actual eight gears, so pretty different experience, just not very quick, I see why they didn't give us paddle shifters, because even if we have paddle shifters, there wouldn't be that much engagement, given the delay of the shifts, but just driving in automatic mode, we're in comfort mode, normal mode, cruising around 1500 RPM, going about speed limit miles per hour, very quiet, very luxurious, I'm loving the seats, the armrest is very comfortable, the moonroof also really helps bring some well-needed light into this cabin, very impressive car, but we got a couple more twisties, just hit them at pretty low speeds, daily speeds, still the steering's super sharp, super direct, and in normal, there's not that much feel through the wheel, sport definitely heavens up the steering, but even in normal, the directness of the wheel really makes the driving experience a lot more enjoyable, all right, let's step onto this highway, before we wrap things up on the gas, strong, strong pull, other than that guys, I'm really impressed with this 2022 Kia K5 EX, really impressive when it comes to the interior luxury, starting around 28,000 bucks, under 30k at the destination, you really can't beat that in this segment, guys, we reviewed the Honda Accord Touring, and it's not even comparable, I think that for an additional 10,000 bucks, outside of the power plant, of course, that power plant is more comparable to the GT, so if you're looking for a more powerful luxury touring vehicle in the segment, that's where I would send you towards the Accord, or maybe even the N-Line Sonata, or the Kia K5 GT, of course, but if you're looking for the best blend of just luxury, solid performance, and features in tech, under 30,000 bucks, I don't think you could beat this in the segment, this is a fantastic vehicle, I would definitely recommend anybody looking for a mid-sized sedan with some features, luxuries, and tech, to definitely try to check this one out, and also huge thanks to Regal Kia in Lakeland, Florida for making this review possible, huge thanks to them, I'll leave a link to their inventory below, and I would definitely recommend anybody looking for a new car in the Other than that, though, thank you so much for watching, I had a great time making this video, if you're new to this channel, please subscribe, if you've already subscribed, thank you so much, you guys know the channel's just not possible without you guys, and I really appreciate all of your constant support, but again, if you haven't subscribed yet, please subscribe, leave a like too, it really helps me out with the YouTube algorithm, that's how these videos get promoted to new people, leave a comment, let me know what you like, let me know what you don't like, and leave a comment, let me know if there's any specific vehicles you'd like to see reviewed in this channel too, and I'll definitely try to get those for you as soon as possible, but other than that, again, thank you guys so much for watching, and I hope all you guys have a great day.