Kia Sportage 2019 review: Si diesel

Is it possible for a car to be chubby? I reckon the Sportage is a little chubby. It’s got a boxy shape with curved corners that give it a well-rounded shape. It makes you want to give it a cuddle and is what I called the Seth Rogan of cars. Cute like a teddy bear, but not slick like the Mazda CX-5 or sporty like the Tucson, and thankfully more interesting than the Toyota RAV4. It still looks decent and you feel good driving it.

The Sportage has a boxy shape with curved corners that give it a well-rounded look.

The interiors step it up a notch as Kia has streamlined the centre console area, so there are less buttons and it’s less fussy. The whole dash and centre area is well designed and even though this is the bottom of the range model, I don’t feel like they have skimped on anything. It certainly doesn’t look like the budget model.

In fact, you still get a leather-trimmed steering wheel which feels so nice to touch under the hands, it really lifts the whole driving experience.

There are fabric seats, but they are comfortable and feel good to sit on and everything is quite tactile, from the soft dash to the volume button on the steering wheel, it all feels good to touch.

The front had lots of room, even my 185cm husband had a good amount of leg and head space, and there was a light breezy feel in the cabin.

My two children aged five and seven had loads of room in the back, enough to climb over one another into their favourite seats. You can also fit a third car seat in. I did it with a baby capsule and two boosters, however it’s not ideal.

Doing seat belts up with three kids in the child seats every day would be really hard work. If you have a third child who’s not in a car seat, they will easily fit though, and we drove to our picnic with the kids’ favourite cousin occupying the middle spot.

Tall teenagers and adults will also have enough room to sit in the back even behind a tall person driving.

The boot is a decent size. At 466L it’s not the biggest in its class but it beats the CX-5. However the Tucson, the RAV4, and the Honda CR-V all have bigger boots. Still, there is heaps of room to fit a pram, and for the picnic we were able to fit two small children’s bikes, two scooters, picnic blankets and rugs but all of our picnic food had to go in the actual cabin.

The base model misses out on a push-start button and electric park brake, but I quite like the old-school manual key start and pull up park brake. It means I always know where my keys are (I have spent far too long in cars searching for the keys!) and I also know whether the park brake is on or off. Simple is sometimes best.

There are two cupholders in the front, one small and one big, plus a spot to place your phone in and a decent sized centre storage bin. The back also gets two cupholders in the armrest and you’ll find a bottle holder in each door.

There are automatic wipers, though the driver and passenger seats are manually put into position which can get a little tiresome, especially if you swap drivers often.

The Sportage has Apple CarPlay and Android Auto across the range which is great. Plug in your phone for instant connection to the multimedia screen and access to main apps like maps and Spotify.

You can use voice control to send/listen to text messages and make phone calls through the car's multimedia system.

Through this you can also use voice control to send/listen to text messages and make phone calls, it’s pretty great.

The sound system is also good so don’t be afraid to turn the volume up.

The Kia Sportage Si in diesel costs $35,500. Fuel consumption is a low 6.4L/100km.

It’s covered by Kia's excellent seven year/unlimited km warranty which includes roadside assist and it's fully transferable which is good news for resale value.