2023 Hyundai Kona N Safety and Reliability

Neither the NHTSA nor the IIHS has a full safety review of the Hyundai Kona N, although the former has awarded it five stars for side-impact tests and four stars for rollover resistance in partial testing. The regular Kona has been fully evaluated, however, returning a five-star overall safety rating, while the IIHS gave it best-possible scores of Good in all crashworthiness categories.

Some might see the Kona N's high-performance brakes as a safety feature, while others might see it as an excuse to go even faster and be more reckless. However, in either case, when something goes wrong, you need real safety gear. To that end, ABS, EBS, stability and traction control all feature, and if things still go wrong, six airbags including side-curtain airbags will cushion your noggin. There's an added layer with active safety systems comprising blind-spot monitoring, rear cross-traffic alert, forward collision avoidance, lane keeping systems, and automatic high beams, and a rearview camera. Driver attention warning and safe exit warning are lesser spotted but equally as impressive.

The Hyundai Kona signifies the halfway point of the first generation's lifespan. That means most of the kinks have been ironed out by now. While the N model itself was newly introduced for the 2022 model year, the fact that there have only been a handful of recalls since the Kona first debuted bodes well for its overall reliability. At the time of this writing, the N itself was recalled once for a loss of drive power, and issue that pertained to the 2022 model.

Where Hyundai wins big points is in its mega warranty coverage. While the standard limited warranty is impressive at five years/60,000 miles, matched by 24-hour roadside assistance for the same time, the powertrain warranty covers a stellar 10 years/100,000 miles of driving. As if that wasn't comprehensive enough, the company also includes complimentary scheduled maintenance for the first three years or 36,000 miles.