2025 Kia Carnival Hybrid First Drive: Great Expectations Met?
The newest member of the minivan club is a homegrown hybrid, but can its 1.6-liter turbo engine manage 1.5 tons of #vanlife?
Pop quiz: Which Kia model attracts the youngest buyers, sells the quickest, and brings 65 percent new buyers to the brand? The affordable, cheerful, sleek new Niro? One of the hot electrics? Nope. It’s the Kia Carnival minivan. Apparently, its SUV cosplay ploy was working, so Kia enhanced that look for 2025. And now that 61 percent of buyers in the segment report considering a hybrid, Kia adopts a fortified version of the Kia Sorento Hybrid’s powertrain, in hopes of steering such buyers away from the hybrids offered in the form of the segment-leading Chrysler Pacifica and Toyota Sienna. The new hybrid boasts class-leading torque but does this wee little 1.6T have the hustle needed to haul eight passengers and their gear?
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A Hybrid but Nothing Like Chrysler’s and Toyota’s
All three of those vans’ systems involve two electric motors assisting a combustion engine. But here in the 2025 Kia Carnival, one of them is a small alternator/motor connected to the engine’s accessory drive while the other mounts where the torque converter would go in a conventional six-speed automatic. Both Toyota’s Hybrid Synergy Drive and Chrysler’s E-Flite (aka SI-EVT) use planetary combiners to blend power from the engine and two stronger motors (Chrysler’s arrangement licenses Timken/Ricardo patents, not Toyota’s). And of course, only the Chrysler’s electric motors are sufficiently powerful to drive the van on electricity alone (up to 32 miles).
Regen Paddles!
Like Kia’s EVs and unlike the Chrysler and Toyota hybrids, steering-wheel-mounted paddles allow you to select from three levels of regenerative braking, or virtually none (Chrysler and Toyota each offer a gearshift lever position to increase engine braking). There is no iPedal or one-pedal driving mode, however, and the feeling differs greatly from what many EV owners have come to expect. Even with L3 selected, there is often a pause between lifting your foot and feeling meaningful deceleration. And the deceleration can get a bit lumpy during transmission downshifts.
Elec-Tricks
Kia engineers claim to have figured out a way to leverage the main electric propulsion motor to limit pitch and shock travel (E-Ride) and to sharpen handling in normal and emergency evasive maneuvers (E-Handling and E-EHA). The theory is that when, for example, traversing a speed bump, a very brief dose of regen braking from the motor can help lower the nose, while a quick spot of acceleration can lift it a bit on the other side. On the handling side, when the driver initiates a lane-change, a momentary whiff of regen serves to load the front tires, enlarging their contact patch to boost grip. When completing the lane change, a bit of extra drive force settles the rear for improved stability. Switching off the traction control disables these functions to enable an A-B comparison. The theory sounds plausible, though the results seem to be infinitesimal. Or at least during our drive we were unable to detect any such electrickery making an impact on the van’s dynamics. A Hybrid screen tracks fuel economy and electric-motor use, while also displaying battery charge level.
So How Does the Hybrid Perform?
It’s a little weak. This is a big vehicle, and especially in top SX-Prestige trim, it weighs about 2.5 tons. Empty. The 74-hp traction motor has its work cut out for it trying to fill in the torque hole while the little turbo spools up. It makes enough torque to spin an inside front tire when turning from a stop, but with the wheel pointed straight, instead of feeling “segment-leading torque (271 lb-ft),” we sensed “segment’s highest weight-to-power ratio (20.7 lb/hp).” With two people aboard, it accelerates amply for your typical around-town minivan duty cycle, and we even managed to observe a self-reported fuel economy slightly in excess of 30 mpg in mixed driving. But we fret that buckling a person into each seatbelt and filling the cargo hold with vacation gear will leave it feeling overburdened and unable to achieve those lofty EPA figures. We’d definitely steer clear of the hybrid if your vacation plans involve towing anything (the limit is 2,500 pounds—1,000 fewer than in the V-6 model).
Enhanced Highway Drive Assist
Other tech transferring in from newer Kias like the EV6 include HDA, which now provides both effective lane-centering and even lane-change assist (signal, keep your hands on the wheel, and it will execute the lane-change—though if it senses you steering at all, it cancels). Top models also get a big head-up display that helpfully indicates blind-spot warnings as well as listing the next navigation prompt. One EV6 feature we’re less thrilled about: The shared capacitive nav/climate-control buttons that always seem to show the wrong mode, requiring you to find the switch to change them to the mode you’re interested in.
When, How Much, and Worth It?
Deliveries of the new 2025 Kia Carnival minivan are happening now, with the Carnival LXS Hybrid starting at $41,895—that’s a $2,000 premium versus the V-6 LXS, and the base V-6 LX is another $2,000 cheaper. Next up is the EX at $44,095, SX at $48,995, and our top-line Carnival SX Prestige test car starts at $53,995. Toyota Sienna pricing starts a little lower and tops out considerably higher. The Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid starts at $52,750, but its big PHEV battery qualifies it for a $7,500 rebate that brings its price down to a mighty attractive $45,250. We need more time in more models to say for sure, but this Kia drive has us leaning toward either the Carnival V-6 or a Sienna or Pacifica hybrid.
I started critiquing cars at age 5 by bumming rides home from church in other parishioners’ new cars. At 16 I started running parts for an Oldsmobile dealership and got hooked on the car biz. Engineering seemed the best way to make a living in it, so with two mechanical engineering degrees I joined Chrysler to work on the Neon, LH cars, and 2nd-gen minivans. Then a friend mentioned an opening for a technical editor at another car magazine, and I did the car-biz equivalent of running off to join the circus. I loved that job too until the phone rang again with what turned out to be an even better opportunity with Motor Trend. It’s nearly impossible to imagine an even better job, but I still answer the phone…
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