2021 Genesis GV80 long-term review

• Introduction: Genesis (take two)
• Update Two: The Burning Question
• Update Three: Matte Point
• Update Four: Stop! Hammer Time
• Update Five: Unidentified Rolling Object
• Farewell: Return of Service

Introduction: Genesis (take two)

Price as tested: $120,600
This month: 582km @ 11.0L/100km

Spoiler alert: the images accompanying this review were taken during 2021 Car of the Year testing. This means two things: 1) COTY is a goer after months of COVID-inflicted uncertainty; and 2) The Genesis was deemed worthy enough to be included in this year’s shortlist of contenders.

That second point is no small achievement. We’ll publish our full COTY coverage in the March 2021 issue, though I can disclose this year’s field was limited to the 10 best cars of 2020. So simply making the starting grid is a big vote of confidence. And for Genesis, it’s crucial that the GV80 receives a warm reception.

There’s a lot riding on this car. After years of trying (and largely failing) to crack the Aussie market with big sedans, Genesis finally has an SUV to tackle our SUV-mad market. And with a smaller GV70 set to join the local ranks soon, there’s a sense that this is a fresh start for Genesis and a chance to gain some much-needed sales traction in its quest to become a genuine alternative to the established luxury players.

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On the luxury front, it’s clear Genesis has gone all-in. Every GV80 is richly specced, though my car is fitted with every possible bell and whistle from the Genesis parts bin. I’m driving the flagship 3.5T AWD, which starts at $108,600 and uses a new twin-turbo V6 with 279kW/530Nm paired to an eight-speed torque converter automatic. A 2.5T four-cylinder petrol is also available (from $90,600), as is a silky-smooth 3.0-litre turbo-diesel ($103,600).

On initial impressions, I have a sneaking suspicion that the diesel could be the pick of the drivetrains, though I’m keen to spend more time with the V6 petrol before making that call.

Inside, ‘my’ GV80 screams luxury. Diamond-stitched seats are made from soft Nappa leather, the carpets are thick and lush, and all of the materials and touch-points feel of a quality to rival Audi. The interior colour combination of blue over tan might not be to everyone’s taste (personally, I like it), but the list of standard equipment is enormous: 14.5-inch central touchscreen, a full safety suite, Apple CarPlay/Android Auto, a powerful 21-speaker sound system from Lexicon and a head-up display.

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This GV80 also has $2000 worth of matte paint and the optional ‘luxury pack’, which for a whopping $10K adds the aforementioned Nappa leather, fully digital dials with a ‘3D function’, 18-way adjustable driver’s seat with massage function, soft-close doors, heated/cooled seats in the front two rows, active noise-cancelling for a quieter cabin, and active high-beam that ‘paints out’ oncoming vehicles so as not to dazzle other drivers.

Those lights quickly prove to be useful. Perhaps drawn to its size and overt luxury, the Genesis became the go-to vehicle for the COTY photo and video crews to lug about their gear and drive back to our nightly digs.

“Man, it’s so comfortable,” was the initial feedback. “And those headlights! The best I’ve ever experienced!” The only negative concerned the way it handles bumps. “It’s not quite as plush or as controlled as I was expecting,” said a fellow COTY judge.

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The comment about the ride is interesting. I’ll dig further into how the GV80 drives next month, though it’s worth noting at the outset that top-spec GV80s are fitted with ‘adaptive control suspension’ that uses a front-facing camera to read the road and prime the adjustable dampers for bumps.

Without giving away too much about how the GV80 performed at COTY, I’m happy to report the GV80 feels like a ‘coming of age’ vehicle for the brand. It’s distinctive to look at, is richly equipped and delivers a sense of ‘business class’ travel on the highway. Whether it’s a match for the established players is something we’ll discover in the coming months.

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Fancy going on a date?

This year’s COTY judging panel includes Richard Ferlazzo, the long-time Holden designer and the man who gave us the Efijy concept car. His verdict on the GV80? “The cabin is nice but the exterior feels dated to me. It reminds me of the Chrysler Portofino concept from the 80s.”

Update Two: The Burning Question

Getting to the crux of the Genesis identity crisis

Price as tested: $120,600
This month: 2321km @ 11.7L/100km
Overall: 2902km @ 11.6L/100km

Things you hear when collecting friends in a Genesis GV80: “Ohhh, is this a Bentley!? I’ve never been in a Bentley! Isn’t this fancy! Actually, is it an Aston? The grille is more Aston Martin… Oh I don’t know! What is it!?”

The giddy sense of expectation is so high as they scramble into the back seats and start cooing over the diamond-stitch leather that it feels a tremendous anticlimax to say, “Well it’s actually a… Genesis.”

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Mostly this is met with perplexed looks, but they’re preferable to what happened when one group of friends included someone who knew their cars. “No, guys, cool your jets,” he proclaimed. “It’s just a Hyundai.”

I’ll admit to feeling slightly stung by that one (I shudder to think how I’d feel if I’d bought a GV80), although these interactions have taught me three things: that badge snobbery is alive and well in Australia, that the GV80’s perceived luxury and quality is the equal of more expensive rivals, and that Genesis still has a long way to go to achieve meaningful brand recognition in our market. Aside from that one know-it-all mate, everyone who has asked about the GV80 has led with, “So what’s a Genesis?”

But while the opinion of others might dip slightly on learning that the GV80 is a fancy Hyundai, my respect for this enormous SUV continues to grow. Driven straight onto my driveway after being poked, prodded and pulled during COTY testing, I barely had enough time to give it a quick wash before it was back on the road heading 1000km north to visit family.

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This annual trek home for Christmas is a brilliant litmus test of a car’s cabin space and comfort, highway refinement and backroad handling. And, in the GV80’s case, it’s also a trip with a clear benchmark given I’ve completed this exact route in many of its direct rivals, including the Audi Q7, Mercedes GLE and BMW X5. And against that competitor set, the Genesis holds its own… with a few exceptions.

Cabin comfort and refinement are key strengths, helped by excellent NVH suppression and an active noise cancelling system (developed by Harmon) that further reduces unwanted tyre and road roar. Combine the hushed cabin with supportive seats and an airy and well-appointed second row with its own heated/cooled seats, multiple USB ports and climate control, and the GV80 really is a serene thing for a family to cover big distances.

No complaints about the boot space either. With the third row folded, the GV80 offers a sizeable 727L and is easy to pack thanks to a wide and low loading bay.

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It wafts along the highway with aplomb, but while the soft, long-stroke suspension is a key strength, fast and winding B-roads did expose some body control issues.

Pitching the GV80 into a tight turn brings more roll than you get in rivals, and if you hit a big mid-corner bump the dampers require two or even three strokes to regain composure. That’s not to say it feels wayward or uncontrolled, and once you learn to account for the body movement and weight transfer it’s actually quite fun to hustle 2.5 tonnes of SUV through a challenging sequence of turns (like watching a sumo wrestler deftly navigate a football agility drill), but it wasn’t long before my passengers started to complain.

Happily, there is a fix. Configuring the ‘Custom’ drive mode to set the dampers into Sport while keeping everything else is Comfort or Auto brings some much-needed control to the damping without introducing any unwanted harshness.

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A bigger annoyance, though, fell to the cruise control. While the adaptive system was fine on the freeway, it was hopeless on undulating roads and would regularly drop into the low 90km/h bracket when heading up hills and speed beyond 110km/h on downhill sections. It became so frustrating that I eventually stopped using the system altogether.

So was the GV80 a match for its more expensive German rivals? On this particular route, yes it was. Body control and cruise control issues aside, we emerged from a 14-hour day in the saddle free of any aches or pains and with enough mental capacity to happily answer the inevitable questions: “Wow, this is nice! What’s a Genesis?”

Update Three: Matte Point

It’s a pernickety paint finish, but is it enough to take the gloss off?

Price as tested: $120,600
This month: 1187km @ 11.3L/100km
Overall: 4090km @ 11.5L/100km

BANG! The unidentified object slams onto the bonnet with such a resounding thud that it makes everyone in the Genesis jump.

Cruising as we are down a typical suburban street, it takes me a moment to realise that the fleeting flash of brown and green that I caught just prior to impact was actually that of a medium-sized branch. Blown free of its perch in the gumtree canopy that skirted the edge of the road, the branch collided with such fury that it felt as though it came screaming in from low orbit rather than a few metres above us.

“What the...” I thought, before: “THE PAINT!”

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Now there are all sorts of special paranoia that comes with car ownership. At the extreme end live a unique breed of enthusiasts who refuse to drive their cars at all (“Clouds look grey, it might rain” and “Lots of loose stones about, might get a stone chip” is the default logic here), but most of us tend to operate in a zone a few steps back from that.

The degree of paranoia varies on the individual but will typically involve: happily parking further away to snag an isolated spot (or better yet, one between two cement poles), habitually scanning the sides of the car for door dings/trolley bumps, drifting to the left of your lane to avoid stone chips from oncoming trucks, and happily practising the ‘two bucket method’ when giving your car a tub.

I’ll admit to all of the above, though the special grey paint on this Genesis has sent my paranoia into overdrive. Hyundai calls it ‘Melbourne Grey’ and its matte finish is a $2000 option. I’m a big fan. Unlike other matte finishes, this one seems to include a fleck of metallic and the way it catches the light (especially in the golden hours of sunrise and sunset) is really something. You need to see it.

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Less endearing are the care instructions. Hyundai has a special document specifically for this paint finish and they initially sound innocuous enough – don’t use any polishing agents or waxes, must hand wash with a soft cloth, and clean off any blemishes or bird dirt immediately, etc. However, then you reach this very ominous line: “Do NOT rub the finish vigorously, as this will burnish the paint finish causing a permanent shiny spot. These cannot be removed”.

Then it drives home the kicker: “Any problem that may arise from neglecting the instructions will not be covered by warranty. Any defects cannot be repaired as polishing, buffing, and small paint repairs are not possible... the vehicle will need to be repainted”.

Needing to keep it clean, but not too clean (easy with the sponge, Alex!) has seen me resort to carrying a bucket and cloth in the boot so I can spring into action whenever I see a dirty spot or well-aimed bird dropping. This has not made me popular with the missus who cringes with embarrassment whenever I pull out the bucket in a public space.

Seriously, though, the level of anxiety the paint has caused hasn’t been worth it (definitely go for the gloss if buying your own GV80), so you can appreciate my wide eyes when the branch hit.

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Mercifully the paint was unbroken but the piece of wood had hit hard enough to cause a dent about the size of a five-cent piece. Hopefully a visit from a paintless dent removal specialist will rectify the ding.

Cursing my rotten luck and shaking my fist at the sky, I try to take solace in the knowledge that the rest of the GV80 experience has been smooth sailing. Three months and 4000km into our loan, the Genesis is fulfilling the role of sumptuous super-sized SUV admirably.

The cabin feels as tightly screwed together as it did on day one, there are no rattles or squeaks, and despite its initially confusing-looking infotainment interface (“It looks like a Lexus system” remarked a friend) I have encountered exactly zero ergonomic frustrations or moments of hesitation while looking for a function. All of this makes it an easy car, ahem, SUV to like. Or in my case, to inevitably worry about while washing and parking.

Update Four: Stop! Hammer Time

The twin-turbo GV80 has more than enough go. And, it turns out, plenty of Woah

Price as tested: $120,600
This month: 1005km @ 13.0L/100km
Overall: 5095km @ 11.8L/100km

Two things have become apparent this month. The first is that the Genesis is quicker and lighter on its feet that its size suggests. Watch a GV80 roll by and you could be forgiven for thinking it has the dynamic panache of a Sherman tank, but the numbers don’t lie; this heavyweight wears ballet shoes.

Well, in a straight line anyway…

With some spare time up our sleeves after filming our latest Drag Race video for our sister title, MOTOR magazine (look us up on YouTube!), we decided to run the GV80 down the strip. And the figures were illuminating.

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Our GV80 is the 3.5-litre petrol twin-turbo V6 with 279kW/530Nm on tap, which is the quickest variant in the three-strong GV80 range, and it knocked over the 0-100km/h sprint in 5.9sec, while the quarter took 14.1sec at 162km/h. That level of performance puts it on par with more expensive rivals from BMW, Audi and Mercedes, but there’s one discipline where the GV80 smashes its competition – braking.

Despite weighing 2.5 tonnes, NBY26G pulled up from 100km/h in 33.4 metres. To give that number context, that’s a full 3.5 metres shorter than what we’ve recorded at the same dragstrip in the Audi Q5 and Volvo XC90, and 2.5 metres better than the BMW X5. In an emergency scenario, that amount of distance can make all the difference.

And it’s not just the petrol V6 GV80 that displays strong braking performance. All three GV80 variants showed impressive stopping power at Car of the Year and actually pulled up from 80km/h to zero in a shorter distance than a Yaris ZR hybrid on both tarmac and dirt.

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The brakes themselves are big but not extraordinarily so, yet the way the GV80 washes off speed is dramatic. As is the sensation from inside the cabin as the big SUV dives heavily onto its nose and bobs for a few damper strokes once it comes to a complete stop.

My second discovery this month is that I’m coming to appreciate the little tech touches inside the cabin. The first is the blind-spot cameras, which show a live video feed of beside the car when you switch on an indicator. It’s the same trick Honda pulled almost a decade ago, except that the Honda only showed vision on the left side of the car while the Genesis shows both flanks. And the vision is shown inside the instrument cluster, not the centre screen, which allows you to retain Google Maps instructions while turning.

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Some of the Wheels team dismissed this blind-spot function (the same tech is available on the Kia Sorento) as a gimmick, but I find it useful every time I drive. It’s an excellent tool to gauge how close your wheels are to the gutter while parking.

And then there’s the crisp 21-speaker Lexicon stereo. It’s part of the feature-heavy $10,000 Luxury pack (which is an option that I first thought too expensive but am now starting to see value in), and its rich sound and clarity are seriously impressive, especially when playing MC Hammer – which, given the braking performance, seems strangely appropriate. “Stop, hammer time!”

Update Five: Unidentified Rolling Object

Confused looks and ‘What is it?’ Dylan gets his turn at questioning Genesis GV80 ownership

Price as tested: $120,600
This month: 1288km @ 11.2L/100km
Overall: 6383km @ 11.7L/100km

The man stood on the corner of the intersection, eyes pointed my way for a solid 10 seconds, head locked on as the lights went green and I petered past in my giant, satin grey, Unidentified Rolling Object. Like so many other bystanders, he was no doubt thinking, ‘What the hell is that thing?’ Welcome to a curious and often humorous daily facet of Genesis GV80 ownership.

Having pinched this car off Inwood for a few weeks, the only real criticism I can fling at the GV80 is – and it’s not even its own fault – that nobody knows what a Genesis is.

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Plainly, for the Genesis nameplate to succeed in a segment where brand snobbery is inescapably a thing (have you seen how large Mercedes grille badges are these days?), Genesis will need marketing even better than its excellent engineering.

That’s not just to assist new owners with things like resale values, but also this car deserves to succeed; it’s a really impressive thing.

Beyond its general anonymity with almost all members of the public – which might actually appeal to a great many people – the criticisms for the GV80 are flatteringly minor. For starters, while getting in and out of the car is a general delight owing to the soft-close doors and electric rear tailgate (with foot opening sensor), for some reason only the front doors are keyless entry.

Even weirder for a car with so many automated features, the electric park brake isn’t automatic (not that you really need it when the car is in Park, but still).

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The 21-speaker 1050w Lexicon sound system, part of the $10K optional Luxury Pack, didn’t blow my mind like I hoped it would.

A full tank of fuel gives, in our testing so far, ‘just’ 564km of range (the tank is 80L; Genesis claims a possible maximum range of 879km). The headlights are smart enough to switch off LEDs as to not dazzle cars ahead with the high beam, but they are not self-levelling or articulating. (Otherwise, they are pretty excellent.) And, lastly, if this was my car I’d be taking it to a dealer to have checked what almost sounds like an on-the-way-out rear wheel bearing.

There are other very minor yet slightly unbecoming mechanical noises during regular operation, too, although in fairness they’re only noticeable because the rest of the car is so quiet. And maybe this particular car has had a hard life... otherwise build quality is more than good.

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But the praise very much outweighs the nit-picking criticisms. Aside from the general lovely, effortless, luxurious motoring it offers, the two things I like most about this car are its power and eagerness; in a big, heavy, soft way, it’s more fun to drive than it has any right to be. And secondly the interior leather quality – buttery, ‘waxy’, smooth, and used extensively through the cabin – is unbelievable for a $120K car. No other cars at this price smell or feel as sumptuously leathery inside as the GV80.

Would I buy one? If the badge on the front was no bother and I cared more for interesting design and engineering, then yes, I’d give the GV80 a look. If only all cars were purchased on such grounds.

Farewell: Return of Service

Spanners come out; Inwood’s wallet stays put

Price as tested: $120,600
This month: 1075km @ 11.0L/100km
Overall: 7458km @ 10.9L/100km

We ticked over 10,000km in the GV80 this month which threw two things into sharp focus.

Firstly, it was a pleasant reminder that buying a Genesis brings certain ownership advantages. The biggest is you don’t have to pay any servicing fees, with the first five years of dealer visits included for no charge. That’s a decent saving, with BMW and Mercedes charging $2250 and $5200 respectively to service their large SUVs through capped-priced servicing programmes.

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Another bonus is you don’t actually need to visit a dealer at service time. If you live within 70km of Sydney, Melbourne or Brisbane, Genesis will collect your car from your house or whatever location you choose.

Fit, finish and overall quality is the other thing that clocking over 10,000km has thrown under the microscope. The good news is that NBY26G has excelled in this area, albeit with two minor mechanical niggles. Inside the cabin feels as tightly screwed together as it did on day one, with nary a squeak or rattle to report.

Thick carpets and floor mats also do a decent job of absorbing dirt and grime, and the lack of piano plastic and the clever use of hot keys and brushed aluminium mean the centre console is largely free of grubby fingerprints and scuffs.

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The only area that requires the occasional wipe down is the silver material that surrounds the gear selector. Mechanically, what sounds like a worn rear wheel bearing and a vibration through the centre console at low rpm are issues that need checking.

Heading in for its first major service also marked the end of our time this particular GV80. Next month we’re swapping it for a diesel variant to verify our suspicion that the silky smooth oiler might just be the GV80 to buy. Stay tuned.