Mitsubishi Pajero vs Kia Carnival

What's the difference?

The Mitsubishi Pajero Sport GLS 2WD seven-seater is a well-built and well-priced family-friendly wagon.

It's nice to drive, has a rather comfortable interior and – bonus – the vehicle on which it's based has proven credibility as a no-nonsense and highly functional touring vehicle.

But in 2WD guise it's missing something: namely Super Select II, which accounts for a considerable chunk of the 4WD Pajero Sport’s appeal – so the absence of that in this 2WD version is a significant negative, in my books.

The not-so-subtle point I’m trying to make? Sure, the 2WD Pajero Sport is a few grand cheaper than its 4WD stablemate and it's a solid value-for-money buy as is, but I reckon paying the extra cash to get your hands on a Pajero Sport that's equipped with Super-Select II is the better bet.

Ok, here's the rub. Everything you just read could well be pointless. You like the Carnival. In fact, it sometimes makes up close to 90 per cent of the sales in its segment, and outsells all of its competitors combined.

So whether I like it or not, I suspect you'll be buying one anyway.

But I can say this - the new Carnival improves the formula right across the board. Well, everything except for price.

The Pajero Sport is 4825mm long (with a 2800mm wheelbase), 1815mm wide and 1835mm high. It has an official kerb weight of 1980kg.

I don’t mind the styling of the Pajero Sport. It doesn’t look as bulky as many of its rivals and it manages to have a rather contemporary, but comfortably middle of the road, presence.

If you’re that concerned about keeping up appearances, perhaps take a look at a Pajero Sport in the metal, drive it, imagine yourself living with it day to day, then make up your own mind whether you think it suits you or not.

Easy.

Surely the greatest trick the Carnival pulls off, and it does so convincingly, is that it manages to make something so quintessentially uncool, the people-mover, and make it look good. Somehow sporty, even.

I like the Carnival's big, bold and blacked-out front end of the GT-Line, and with its two-tone 19-inch alloys, wide stance and low ride height, it looks almost like some mad attempt at a JDM tune car, rather than a sensible people mover.

Elsewhere, the boxy profile, the sharp body creases and the third-row compartment that kind of juts over the rear tyres like a house that's been extended all somehow work, and give the Carnival far more street cred than you might expect.

Inside, we spent time only in the flagship GT-Line and its GT-Line Lite sibling, and both present as calming, comfortable spaces, and Kia's minimalist approach to combining the climate and audio controls into a single strip (it's functionality can be changed by pushing a button) helps keep the cabin fuss free.

The tech in the top-spec models feels modern and on-point, too, and the materials are all nice under the touch. Be warned though, the cabin plastics get progressively worse the further back you sit, and the third row is cocooned by hard and scratchy plastics.

The interior has a practical and familiar feel about it. Sure, it’s a bit on the basic side of things – with cloth seats and rubber floor mats – and it certainly lacks the plethora of soft-touch surfaces some of its more expensive rivals may have, but this interior’s life-friendly sense is a bigger positive for it than any posh addition could be.

The front seats are rather supportive, with a real snug feel to them, and are manually adjustable, which is fine with me.

The reach- and height-adjustable steering wheel has paddle shifters for when your driving takes on more of a sense of urgency. 

The dash and 8.0-inch touchscreen media unit has an integrated sense to it. And this cabin’s all-pervasive sense of familiarity continues here with all of the buttons and dials easy to spot on the fly and, more importantly, operate without fumbling around for them.

Driver and front passenger have access to media and aircon controls, among others, as well as cup-holders in between the front seats, a bottle holder in each of the doors, and small spots here and there for your wallet, keys etc.

The second row is suitably comfortable and I sat behind my driving position and there was plenty of head and leg room. It’d be much squeezier for those of us who stand at six-feet (182cm) or beyond.

Second-row passengers have access to a fold-down arm-rest with cup holders, air vents and there are USB charge points and a power socket in the rear of the centre-console. 

The seat-backs have map pockets and the doors each have a bottle holder.

The second row is equipped with three child-seat top-tether points, and two ISOFIX points. It is a 60:40 split-fold configuration.

Passengers in the third-row seat have access to cup-holders and air vents, but that’s little compensation because the space back here is on the wrong side of tight. 

The third row is a 50:50 split-fold configuration.

In terms of packability, the rear cargo area’s volume is listed as 131 litres when all three rows are being used as seating; 502 litres when two rows are in use; and 1488 when the second and third rows are stowed away. 

Annoyingly, the third row is a real bugger to stow away and doesn’t fold flat into the floor. Maybe I’m missing a trick but this third-row strife was a source of more than a bit of frustration for the photographer and I – and we’re both experienced vehicle-based travellers.

The rear cargo area is equipped with power sockets and tie-down points. There is a shallow underfloor storage box back there as well.

The Carnival measures 5115mm in length, 1995mm in width and 1775mm in height, and it rides on a sizeable 3092mm wheelbase. 

And those mini-van dimensions have a predictably positive impact on luggage space, with room growing from 627 litres with all seating rows in place, to a massive 2827 litres with the third row stowed.

The key practicality perk here, though, is space, and lots of it. At 175cm, there was ample room for me in the middle row, and you can configure the cabin to your liking, too. You can slide the row on rails, for example, to prioritise leg room where you need it, and the middle seat folds down to reveal cupholders in a kind of hard plastic travel tray.

But even in the third row I could easily get comfortable, though head room begins to get a little tighter. There are cupholders and USB connection points, too, and I can honestly say you could send full-size humans back there and not feel overly guilty about it.

The Carnival will tow 2000kgs braked, too.

Bad news first. The price is higher this time around, right across the five-trim line-up, with the prices up between around $2600 and $5300, depending on which trim level you’re shopping for.

Prices start at $50,150 for the entry-level S petrol, and climb to $72,910 for the top-spec GT-Line diesel. There’s also a GT-Line Hybrid, which tops the group at $76,210, but it’s not here yet, so we’ll cross that electrified bridge when we get to it and stick with the ICE range for now.

The range opens with the S ($50,150 petrol, $52,380 diesel), which scores 17-inch alloys, LED headlights and DRLs, heated mirrors, cloth seats, an electronic parking brake, and a smart key with push-button start, which is new for this update.

On the tech front, there is a new integrated 4.0-inch driver display, and a new 12.3-inch central screen with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, linking with an eight-speaker sound system, now with a surround-sound function.

Stepping up to the Sport ($56,050 petrol, $58,280 diesel) adds 18-inch alloys, rear LED combination lamps, a leather steering wheel and shifter, and dual-zone climate up front with single-zone temperature control in the second row. New for this update is a wireless charging pad and artificial leather seats. 

Next is the Sport+ ($62,380 petrol, $64,610 diesel), which gets a whole host of new safety equipment, which we will come back to in a moment, along with a powered tailgate, automatic sliding doors and auto windows, and heated seats in the first and second rows. It also ups the tech, with twin 12.3-inch screens taking care of multimedia and driving info duties.

Then comes the GT-Line Lite ($66,350 petrol, $68,580 diesel), which is fitted with bigger 19-inch alloy wheels, scores LED interior lighting, gets a dual-pane auto sunroof and some chrome embellishments on the exterior. The trade-off, though is that the powered windows are now for the driver only, as is the powered front seat.

Finally, there’s the flagship GT-Line ($70,680 petrol, $72,910 diesel), which nabs dual-projection headlights, a heated steering wheel, a 12-speaker BOSE sound system, ventilated seats up front, a big head-up display and a digital rear-view mirror, along with a slightly better interior treatment and the return of the auto window and powered seat to the passenger side of the car.

The Pajero Sport has a 2.4-litre, four-cylinder turbo-diesel engine, which produces 133kW at 3500rpm and 430Nm at 2500rpm, and it has an eight-speed automatic transmission.

This 2WD variant does not have Mitsubishi’s impressive Super-Select II 4WD system, of which I’m a big fan, and that absence is a substantial negative against it, I reckon. But more about that very soon…

There are two ICE options on the table here. The first is what I reckon is the lesser of the two, a 3.5-litre petrol V6, producing a rev-happy 216kW and 355Nm.

The better option, I think, is the 2.2-litre, four-cylinder diesel, which makes 148kW and 440Nm, and just suits the nature of the car a little better.

Both pair with an eight-speed automatic, and send their power to the front tyres.

The 2WD Pajero Sport has an offical fuel consumption of 8.0L/100km on a combined cycle. 

On our test, which included a stint of dirt-road driving, we recorded fuel consumption from fill to fill of 9.2L/100km.

It has a 68-litre fuel tank so, with that sort of fuel-consumption figure, you can reasonably expect a driving range of approximately 690km from a full tank, but that’s factoring in a safe-distance buffer of 50km.

The petrol engine will sip a claimed 9.6 litres per hundred kilometres on the combined cycle, and produce 220g per kilometre of C02. The diesel lowers both those numbers, to 6.5 litres and 170 grams.

Both models are fitted with a 72-litre fuel tank, which means you’ll be sailing well north of $100 to fill one up.

This is mostly a smooth driving wagon while tackling daily duties on the blacktop and with some highway stretches thrown into the mix. 

Steering has a nice weight to it and the Pajero Sport is a nimble, highly manoeuvrable SUV, with a turning circle of 11.2m, even if it does start to reveal more than a bit of body-roll through more aggressive driving. No surprise and no worries – this is an SUV after all, not a sports car. 

Also, worth noting is the fact that our test vehicle’s alloy bullbar made it heavier at the front end thus affecting its handling somewhat.

Throttle response is sharp and the 2WD Pajero Sport retains the line-up’s punchy turbo-diesel engine and teamed with the eight-speed auto it makes for a quietly effective, rarely stressed working partnership, rather than an energetic match-up.

The suspension set-up here – double wishbones with coil springs and stabiliser bar at the front, and three-link, coil springs and stabiliser bar at the rear – yields a very firm ride and one which can tend towards jarring if you’re traversing chopped-up back-country bitumen or really anything beyond bitumen that's in good nick.

The tyres – Toyo Open Country A32 (265/60R18) – are well-suited to bitumen, not so much to off-roading, which is perfectly reasonable for this 2WD vehicle. Also, this rubber is on the correct side of quiet.

As mentioned earlier, Mitsubishi’s Super-Select II 4WD system is missing from this variant, obviously, as this is a 2WD. And that’s a crying shame because even if you never venture off the road, Super-Select II is very handy. In Pajero Sports equipped with it, you can drive in 4H (4WD high range) even on bitumen or any high-traction surface because 4H in this vehicle means that – and I’m directly quoting Mitsubishi’s offical system explanation here – “all wheels are driven via the transfer case with an open centre differential, this means all four wheels will send power to the ground while still operating independently of one another”.

If you drove like that in most other 4WDs – at speed in 4H on bitumen or the like – you’d risk transmission wind-up, but there’s no danger of that in a 4WD Pajero Sport because its centre diff is open, not locked, when 4H is engaged.

This gives the driver increased traction and so better control and that means it’s a safer all-round driving experience for everyone involved.

Unfortunately, none of those benefits are available in this 2WD variant.

Having said all of that, this Pajero Sport is very drivable, functional and still manages to retain respectable, if not high, levels of refinement.

Forgive the horrific paraphrasing, but it seems rumours of the death of diesel have been greatly exaggerated, at least when it comes to the Kia Carnival.

Get this – diesel sales make up some 90 per cent of the Carnival's total haul, with petrol providing a pittance towards the sales total, presumably being picked up by fleet buyers.

And to be honest, that means nine out of 10 people are making the right choice here. Yes, the petrol makes more power, but it's the torque on offer from the diesel that makes pushing the Carnival around feel far more effortless.

The petrol engine can definitely get you moving, but it feels a bit too rev-happy and thrashy when you really put your foot down, and its significantly thirstier to boot.

The diesel isn't perfect – the thrum of the engine is a constant companion whenever you put your foot down, and there's actually too much torque on offer at times, like if you're accelerating up hill from a standstill on a damp road, and so the front tyres can scrabble and scramble for grip.

But it otherwise so perfectly suits the nature of the Carnival that it is definitely the best and most satisfying choice.

Another big change for this update is the fact that Kia's complete ride and handling program has been rolled out here. Kia says local work done on the outgoing car, the one this replaces, was curtailed by Covid and bushfires, and so ended up being done by correspondence.

This one, though, has had the whole enchilada thrown at it, and it shows. They've succeeded in making a bigger car feel smaller around you. It's not a sports car by any measure, but nor does it ever feel too big and unwieldily.

Part of that is down to the steering, which is direct and confidence inspiring, but mostly I suspect it's because of the ride, which is firmer than you might expect in a family hauler, but also offers a connection to that road below that makes you feel in control.

Whether a firm-ish ride is a perk or negative is up to you, but it definitely works for me.

Part of the change package for this updated Carnival is in its safety kit, some of which simply wasn’t available when Kia launched its predecessor.

Which is why every model now gets a centre side airbag, 'Forward Collision Assist AEB', 'Rear Occupant Alert', 'Trailer Stability Assist' and front parking sensors, joining the rear ones that were already there.

Sport+ Models and up now add a 'Blind Spot View Monitor' and rain-sensing wipers, as well as rear AEB through the 'Parking Collision Avoidance' function.

I have to say, though, when your entry-level car is $50k-plus, there’s no real excuse for limiting the best safety kit to the upper-spec models.

Also standard are lane keep assist, with 'Lane Follow Assist', multi-collision braking, a speed-limit warning (which you will turn off) and a reversing camera.

The Carnival range carries a five-star ANCAP safety rating, which it earned in 2021.

Pajero Sport 2WD is eligible for Mitsubishi's so-called "10/10 Diamond Advantage" package, which includes a 10-year/200,000km warranty and 10 year/150,000km capped price servicing. But you need to ensure you get the vehicle serviced at an authorised Mitsubishi dealer to take advantage of the 10-year warranty plan.

Each capped price servicing extends free roadside assistance by another 12 months.

The servicing schedule and costs per service are: $399 (at 12months/15,000), $399 (24 months/30,000km), $499 (36 months/45,000km), $699 (48 months/60,000km), $499 (60 months/75,000km), $699 (72 months/90,000km), $499 (84 months/105,000km), $999 (96 months/120,000km), $599 (108 months/135,000km), and $699 (120 months/150,000km).

Like all Kias, the Carnival arrives with a seven-year, unlimited-kilometre warranty, with capped-price servicing throughout.

Kia’s servicing costs are higher than some of its competitors, though, so you might want to compare them, as well as compare what’s included, and the diesel model will usually cost slightly more to maintain than the petrol version.

Service intervals are every 12 months or 15,000kms, and while the brand is still finalising the petrol servicing costs, the diesel prices are $386, $682, $480, $869, $434, $845 and $461, covering the first seven years of ownership.