Hyundai Santa Fe review – an arresting and upmarket seven-seater

Verdict - Is the Hyundai Santa Fe a good car?

While it's still early days, our time testing the Hyundai Santa Fe in South Korea and now the UK, shows it’s a more capable and appealing five, six or seven-seater SUV than its predecessor in almost every way. Hyundai has turned it up a notch in terms of its premium feel inside, with added tech and good quality materials which will help it appeal to not only family-car buyers, but also those who may be considering a seven-seater from premium rivals such as Land Rover. The entry-level Premium trim will offer more than enough content for most buyers, it’s just a shame the ride on large alloy wheels is a bit unsettled, and the hybrid’s petrol engine is eager to kick in at suburban speeds.

Hyundai Santa Fe models, specs and alternatives

The Hyundai Santa Fe is the South Korean brand’s flagship SUV, offering from five to seven seats and plenty of practicality for a large family. For this iteration, rather than trying to disguise its SUV proportions with wacky styling or sleek curves, Hyundai has instead designed the Santa Fe with unapologetically boxy, yet clean lines. We wouldn’t expect the Santa Fe’s looks to be particularly controversial with most buyers, though it’s at the rear where it could divide opinion with its unusually low-down taillights, and we found the Santa Fe seriously attention-grabbing as we drove it.

Elsewhere the Santa Fe flaunts its chunkiness with large angular wheel arches and H-shaped LED daytime running lights. It’s a look that wouldn’t look too out of place next to the Hyundai Ioniq 5 EV, and is sure to have Land Rover Discovery owners doing a double-take.

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The Santa Fe’s styling means it looks purposeful, and it appears as though Hyundai wants buyers to consider this iteration as a more rugged, outdoorsy car than before, evidenced by the brand’s heavy emphasis on its practical tailgate it says doubles up as a ‘terrace’ – a place where users might sit and admire the great outdoors after a day of hiking or other activity, for example. 

In practice, though, we reckon most buyers of the Santa Fe will be those with big families in need of seven seats and generous boot space, and this is an area where it excels – there’s certainly enough space for every occupant, even in the back row. 

As a result, the Hyundai Santa Fe’s rivals include other adventure-enabling cars such as the Land Rover Defender or Discovery, but Hyundai is positioning the Santa Fe as a slightly more high-end proposition than the old model, so it’s also taking on premium rivals such as the Audi Q7 or BMW X5.

Of course, rivals still include the likes of the Nissan X-Trail, Kia Sorento and Skoda Kodiaq. UK pricing for the Santa Fe starts from just under £47,000, which isn’t a huge increase over the outgoing car’s £45,000 price tag, especially given the extra kit and move further upmarket, but it does make it quite expensive when compared to rivals like the Kodiaq that starts from £36k.

All versions of the Hyundai Santa Fe are hybrid, with a full-hybrid and plug-in hybrid coming to the UK. We first tested the Hyundai Santa Fe on South Korea’s roads in hybrid guise, which uses a 1.6-litre engine and electric motor, and we’ve now also tried it out on Welsh roads. Despite having a combustion engine that’s pretty small for a car this size, the Santa Fe’s powerplant feels capable enough for most, although rivals such as the BMW X5 will be better suited to satisfying keen drivers. The Santa Fe is a model that will appeal more to those with a priority on space and comfort. While it can’t tow as much as some rivals, even the least capable Santa Fe can haul a 1,900kg trailer, which should be plenty for most drivers.

Trims are Premium, Ultimate and Calligraphy, and we reckon the first and most affordable is the one to recommend, with features like its swish infotainment, powered tailgate and heated front seats all standard. Ultimate adds some nice additions like a panoramic sunroof, while Calligraphy takes the luxury up a notch with Nappa leather upholstery, but also ratchets up the price to around £53k.

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Hyundai Santa Fe alternatives

Premium SUVs and 4x4s

It might be Hyundai's flagship SUV, but the South Korean brand has only recently begun challenging the likes of Land Rover, BMW and Audi. If an affordable alternative with a long warranty sounds appealing, look no further than the Santa Fe. 

• Land Rover Defender
• Land Rover Discovery
• BMW X5
• Audi Q7

Large SUVs

While the large seven-seat SUV class isn't as packed out as the mid-size SUV arena, there are still some excellent rivals, including the Skoda Kodiaq that scooped our Best Large Family Car title.

• Nissan X-Trail
• Skoda Kodiaq
• Kia Sorento

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The fully-hybrid model can return up to 41.5mpg with two-wheel drive, which isn’t too bad for a car with up to seven seats, but won’t set the world alight either. This figure drops a bit to 38.7mpg on the WLTP cycle for the same powertrain and four-wheel drive, so we’d forgo this unless we lived in a rural area prone to slippery conditions. Emissions from 155g/km also won’t enamour the Santa Fe with company car choosers.

The plug-in hybrid gets a much higher official figure of up to 166mpg, but be aware that in real-world conditions plug-in hybrids are unlikely to achieve these lofty on-paper mpg figures unless you keep the battery charged up frequently and run on electricity for the vast majority of the time. Regardless, this results in a low 38g/km CO2 figure for taxation that’s easier to swallow for business drivers. It’s worth noting, however, that this is higher than the 9-11g/km of the Kodiaq PHEV, which has double the Santa Fe’s engine-off driving range.

Insurance

Hyundai is yet to release any details on insurance groups and costs for the Santa Fe, but the previous model sat in groups in the 20-30 range (out of 50), so we’d expect similar for the new car. This will make it fairly expensive to insure, but no worse than other large and relatively complex SUVs.

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Stepping into the latest Hyundai Santa Fe, we were struck with how high-end it felt compared to the outgoing car, and this is also reflected in the driving experience. In the full hybrid the electric motor does its best work at low speeds, making for smooth and quiet acceleration around town. This also means it’s not really built with driving enthusiasts in mind – for more composure and driving feel you’d be better off with a BMW X5, which can be optioned with an extra row of seats to make it a seven-seater too.

Press the Santa Fe’s accelerator even a tiny amount at 30mph or more and the four-cylinder petrol fires into life, and the engine sounds rather coarse in the process, making it less refined than a Skoda Kodiaq when pushed hard. We also found the automatic gearbox a bit reluctant to downshift for quicker acceleration, and while swapping into Sport mode does make the throttle a bit more reactive, it’s not a really significant change. There’s a three-step regenerative braking system, but we’d prefer it to be even stronger in its highest setting, because it still takes a long distance to slow the car down, and doesn’t bring it to a halt for ‘one-pedal driving’.

We tested a Santa Fe Hybrid on 18-inch and 21-inch alloy wheels on South Korean roads – while the 18-inch alloys are more comfortable to ride on, even the car with 21-inch wheels felt nicely composed on its relatively smooth tarmac. We’ve now also tested the largest 20-inch wheel option in the UK, and found the ride struggled to settle down, and that road noise was reasonably pronounced at motorway speeds.

Visibility from behind the wheel is very good, partly because of the Santa Fe’s reasonably thin windscreen pillars, and also because of its raised height. We took the four-wheel drive Santa Fe hybrid off-road, and it wasn't flustered by the course, while its hill-descent setting was reassuring while heading down steep and slippy slopes. Drivers can pick mud, sand and snow driving modes to alter the car’s behaviour accordingly.

Plug-in hybrid model

The plug-in hybrid will also be making its way to the UK, and while we’re yet to drive it, we’d expect it to be just as refined. It uses the same petrol engine, and a longer electric range compared to the hybrid model means it will be able to run with the petrol engine off, making it quieter more of the time. We’ll have to reserve full judgement for when we get a chance to drive it to see how smoothly the system transitions from electric to petrol power, and if the added weight of the larger battery affects its driving feel.

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Stepping into the Hyundai Santa Fe, you immediately get a sense that quality has improved over the old model. While generally we're big fans of physical switchgear to complement touchscreen controls, the old model took it a little too far the other way, with a messy-looking dashboard cluttered with dated buttons and dials. 

Infotainment and navigation

This time, Hyundai has got the balance right; the Santa Fe’s new interior gets an attractive, curved panoramic display on the dashboard, made up of one 12.3-inch infotainment screen, and another 12.3-inch crisp digital gauge cluster that sits in front of the driver, displaying important information such as speed or fuel economy.

The latest Santa Fe hasn’t forgone physical dials completely, so there’s a touch-sensitive climate control panel under the air vents complete with easy-to-use rotary dials you can turn to adjust the temperature. While some of the touch controls aren’t particularly easy to see in bright sunlight, and are a bit of a fingerprint magnet, we much prefer them to having to dig into the infotainment menus each time.

We like that the interior gets some neat touches such as USB charging ports in the seatbacks to allow passengers to power their devices, two large wireless charging pads up front, and plenty of storage compartments. Some trims are even set to get a UV-C Sterilisation Tray, a compartment which uses UV rays to kill bacteria on any objects you place inside of it – we’re not sure how useful most buyers will find this, but it’s worth mentioning nonetheless.

Trim levels for the UK are Premium, Ultimate and Calligraphy, with even the former getting both digital displays, a powered tailgate, wireless Apple CarPlay/Android Auto, a smartphone charging pad, keyless entry, heated and electric front seats and lots of driving aids. For around £3,500 extra, Ultimate packs in a Bose sound system, head-up display, a panoramic sunroof, heated rear seats and dual charging pads. Buyers can also pick from ‘Pecan Brown’ or ‘Supersonic Grey’ interior colourways.

We tested the flagship Calligraphy trim, but considering it starts from £53,000 and the entry-level Premium trim is so well kitted out, we wouldn’t recommend it. It’s certainly a lovely thing though, with Nappa leather upholstery, ‘Premium Relaxation’ front seats and the aforementioned UV-C device.

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The Hyundai Santa Fe is a big car, and that translates to a spacious cabin. There’s the choice of five, six or seven-seat configurations. The latter two are spread over three rows, with the six-seater’s middle row sporting two large ‘captain’s chairs’ instead of a bench, for added comfort – although this does cost £1,000 extra.

Even in the seven-seat version, every space is large enough for a fully grown adult – even for those sitting in the back row, with extremely generous headroom. The Santa Fe certainly gives the Land Rover Discovery a run for its money in this area, because we’d only recommend children sit in the rearmost seats of the Discovery on longer journeys – there’s plenty of legroom in all three rows. The Santa Fe’s middle row is highly adjustable, too, so you can move it backwards or forwards to prioritise leg room or luggage space as necessary, and there’s more space and elbow room than in the Skoda Kodiaq, with slightly better access to the rear seats.

We also liked the Hyundai Santa Fe’s interior usability. There are plenty of storage compartments located around the cabin to boost practicality further and USB ports in the seat backs allow every passenger to charge a device. The centre console alone can store two cups and smartphones, not to mention the huge tray underneath and another large storage cubby within the armrest.

Traditionally the Santa Fe has been a favourite amongst buyers towing heavy caravans, horseboxes and trailers, and it’s still to be seen how the lack of a diesel engine option could affect its ability in this department. In the outgoing model the diesel could haul 2,500kg, while petrol and hybrid models peaked at 1,650kg.

Boot space

At 628 litres, the Hyundai Santa Fe’s boot capacity is larger than the outgoing car’s with just five seats in place, and we had no issues packing in all our luggage, bags and camera equipment when we tested it, even with the second row of seats positioned all the way back. Fold all the back seats down and space increases to a massive 1,949 litres, which is amongst the best in class.

The speed at which the Santa Fe’s powered boot lid opens and closes can be adjusted to your preference, as can the height the tailgate opens to, so if you’re a smaller person you can tweak the settings to make it easier to reach. Hyundai has referred to the Santa Fe’s wide rear opening and boot as a ‘terrace’ where users can sit and enjoy it as a social space. We expect most buyers will use it in a more conventional manner, but it could come in handy on camping trips or at outdoor events.

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It’s too early to get an idea of Hyundai Santa Fe reliability data, but as a wider brand, Hyundai performed averagely in the 2023 and 2024 Driver Power customer satisfaction surveys, coming in 17th place out of 32 carmakers. Reliability is also middling for the company, with 22.8% of owners reporting an issue with their Hyundai in the first year.

Safety

The Hyundai Santa Fe has yet to be tested by Euro NCAP, but given the old car got a five-star rating – and the mechanically similar Kia Sorento also managed this – we can expect the new one to build on this achievement. In fact, Hyundai says that while the old car was fitted with six airbags, the new one adds another four to offer even better protection for occupants, and a curtain airbag will now even cover the third row. A comprehensive suite of safety and driver assistance tech is standard on the new Santa Fe, including Lane Follow Assist, which helps the car stay in the middle of its lane on the motorway. 

It’s part of the brand’s Highway Driving Assist 2.0, which uses sensors and GPS data to deliver Level 2 autonomous driving capability which allows the car to automatically brake, accelerate and overtake on the motorway when activated.