Isuzu NNR vs Hyundai Ioniq 6

What's the difference?

The dual-cab ute market and light truck market are potentially two very different landscapes.

While the dual-cab continues to storm the sales charts in Australia, there’s also a growing awareness among hardcore users of these vehicles, that a light truck might often be a better solution.

Better payloads and higher Gross Combination Mass ratings in an age of increasing legal and insurance concerns over overloaded vehicles, were once the light truck’s strong suit. But these days, vehicles like the full-sized US-made pick-ups and even the muscled-up Ford Ranger Super Duty have bridged or even exceeded that gap.

At which point, the light-truck’s benefits become the ease with which it can take on heavier jobs and the sheer size of the cargo and cabin area, not to mention those truck-specific qualities born of generations of refining a concept.

In Australia, it’s Isuzu that absolutely brains the opposition in sales terms. And part of the reason for that has been a realisation that not all would-be buyers want the hassle of the traditional truck-buying process of purchasing a bare chassis and then equipping it so suit their needs.

Which is where Isuzu’s RTW (ready To Work) concept comes in. You simply choose the truck you want, choose a tray, van or service body and then let Isuzu deal with it and phone you when it’s ready to collect.

It's so simple, it’s a wonder not everybody is doing it.

The other news is that Isuzu has finally updated its popular N Series fleet after about 16 years. A new cabin, extensive chassis changes, uprated engines, and all-new transmission, improved suspension and a new focus on safety are all headlines. But 16 years is a long time between drinks, so do the improvements make enough of a difference to keep the concept relevant in a changing market?

This new Hyundai Ioniq 6 N asks one important question for the brand - how far can Hyundai go?

Not in the sense of driving range, but rather how far can the brand go in terms of both performance and price. The Ioniq 6 N pushes the limit on both, offering supercar levels of power and performance and at a price that continues to take the brand into unchartered territory.

This is the follow-up to the groundbreaking Ioniq 5 N, the all-electric performance SUV that launched in 2024. But, as you’d expect, in the intervening time Hyundai has been able to make improvements to push the Ioniq 6 N to new levels.

The Ioniq 5 N dramatically raised the bar for Hyundai, offering up to 478kW of power and 770Nm of torque, way beyond the 242kW/348Nm offered by the brand’s i30 N hot hatch. This was Hyundai’s ‘Godzilla moment’, when the Skyline GT-R changed the image of Nissan forever. 

Now the Ioniq 6 N looks to push things even further. And it does so as the sole Ioniq 6 model grade in 2026, with the rest of the range currently unavailable in Australia, as the local operation waits for the facelifted model to arrive sometime in the future.