2024 Kia Sorento Sports EV9-Like Face, Revised Cabin

Kia's 'tweener SUV gets a family facelift for 2024.

We like the current Kia Sorento here at AutoGuide. Managing editor Mike Schlee just crowned it the winner of a recent comparison. The Korean brand's three-row is something of a Goldilocks SUV: bigger than two-row crew, but a more manageable size than the Telluride and others of its ilk. And it's come with a variety of powertrains since debuting for the 2021 model year. Now, three years later, the brand is treating this right-sized SUV to a round of updates inside and out.

These first official photos arrived on Tuesday, showcasing an EV9-like facelift. Out go today's wide, rectangular headlights, and in come vertical units with narrow LED "eyebrows" that connect to the wide grille. The sides of the Sorento look pretty much the same, save for new wheel designs—here, a complicated two-tone look. Out back, the previously-split taillights are now joined at the top, forming two big lowercase n's. In one of our least favorite modern car design trends, Kia has seemingly moved the reverse lights even further down, to the bottom of the bumper.

The interior ditches the Death Star-like quartet of air vents of the current model. Reshaped vents still frame the dashboard, but there's now a slimline "hidden" vent running along it as well. The shelf-like design houses a new curved display, which combines the pair of 12.3-inch screens under one frame. The infotainment system will run the latest Connected Car Navigation Cockpit setup, Kia's new user interface set to debut here on the EV9. Underneath, we see the swappable touch control panel, and a slightly rejigged center console. Kia mentions a fingerprint scanner, capable of starting the SUV, ending valet mode, or "making a simple payment."

Along with the tech upgrade, the 2024 Sorento will debut new interior and exterior colors, the latter of which will include previously seen Interstellar Grey and Cityscape Green, along with the Volcanic Sand Brown seen here.

The Sorento is closely related to the Hyundai Santa Fe, which once again joins it in offering three rows of seats as part of its radical 2024 redesign. With this being a facelift, we don't expect the Sorento to join its sibling on the new platform for a few more years yet.

Kia says it will release further details on the gas, hybrid AWD, and diesel models in its home market next month. We don't get the latter in North America, and we expect the wait to be a bit longer here.

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