Kia PV5 Passenger 2026 review | The most practical five-seat EV money can buy

What is the Kia PV5 Passenger?

Well, to put it bluntly, it’s a van with windows. That really is the long and the short of it. But the PV5 (technically PV5 Passenger, to differentiate it from the PV5 Cargo commercial version, but given that’s a bit of a mouthful, we’ll just call it the PV5 here) is a bit different to rivals like the Citroen e-Spacetourer and Ford E-Tourneo Custom.

Like those rivals, it is indeed based on a commercial vehicle. But unlike those rivals, said commercial vehicle has been designed to stand out from the crowd – and so the passenger version does too.

In that way, it’s a bit like the Volkswagen ID.Buzz. Except the PV5 costs about half as much as the ID.Buzz – and that will make it hugely appealing to family buyers looking for the unmatchable versatility that you get with one of these electric passenger vans, who don’t want to pay over the odds for a bit of fancy styling.

How practical is it?

No prizes for guessing the PV5 is exceptionally practical. Let’s start in the boot where, even with all five seats in place, you get a colossal 1,330 litres of boot space to play with. Not only is that leagues ahead of anything you’d get in a big five-seat SUV, but it’s also more than you’ll find in the five-seat Volkswagen ID.Buzz.

But it isn’t just the volume on offer here that’s so impressive – it’s also the squared-off, boxy shape of the boot area, which makes it easy to take maximum advantage of all that space.

There’s a big, hidden storage area beneath the boot floor, too, which is handy for tucking charging cables away out of sight. What’s more, along the side of the boot are two sectioned-off cubbies where you can keep smaller bits and bobs.

And along the walls, you also get a clever set of rails, which can be used to attach certain accessories, such as first aid kits, umbrella holders, sunglasses cases, and so on. Kia calls this system AddGear, and there are several more slots where you can add these accessories dotted throughout the passenger cabin, too.

Not that you necessarily need them, because storage space for passengers’ odds and ends is excellent too, with countless slots, nooks and cubbies where they can stash devices, water bottles, and so on.

And for the passengers themselves, the PV5’s vertical sides and high roof mean there are acres of head and shoulder room; leg room, meanwhile, is correspondingly vast.

You might be disappointed to find that the rear seats aren’t all that clever – you can’t really remove them, and while they do fold, they don’t slide or tumble like they do in the ID.Buzz.

Then again, given just how much space is on offer here, you’re only ever going to find that to be a problem on the odd occasion you want to slide in a particularly long, bulky load, whereupon you’ll have to contend with the considerable step up from the low boot floor to the folded rear seats.

For now, the PV5 is only available as a five-seater, but a seven-seat option is due to come along later this year. We’ll bring you more on that when we’ve tried it.

One thing you’ll really notice about the PV5 is that the bottom edges of its windows are set remarkably low. This has two advantages: it means your rear-seat passengers get a great view out, helping to prevent car sickness. And it means that for those in the front, visibility is terrific, which makes judging entry into parking bays particularly easy – helped by the PV5’s snub nose and flat tail.

It also means you feel as though you sit high up, in a commanding driving position, when you’re driving the PV5, with the window line down at your hip level. There are cubbies and slots everywhere too, so you should have no trouble finding somewhere to store your odds and ends.

What’s it like to drive?

You can have your PV5 with a choice of two batteries. The smallest, a 51.5kW (gross) ‘battery, is only available with the entry-level version, and comes with a 120bhp motor driving the front wheels. This ‘standard-range’ model is really only suited to urban and occasional long-distance use, though, as the official range is just 183 miles – which means in the real world, it’ll struggle to muster up more than 140 miles or so, and that figure will drop further in the winter.

You’re better off sticking with the 71.2kWh (gross) battery pack, then, which can be had with both versions of the PV5, particularly given you get a boost in power to 161bhp.

Mind you, even this ‘long-range’ version still only gives you 256 miles of range, or just shy of 200 miles in real-world motoring, which is still less than ideal. An ‘even longer-range’ model, perhaps using the 81.4kWh pack from the EV5, would be a nice option to have, but sadly Kia hasn’t announced any plans to introduce such a thing – yet.

Sports car performance was never going to be a factor here, but even so, the 12.8 seconds that the standard-range version takes to get to 62mph feels rather tedious. Just one more reason to opt for the long-range version, then, which completes the same sprint in 10.8 seconds; hardly lightning quick, but out on the road it feels plenty sprightly enough to keep up with traffic.

You don’t get 800V charging like you do in the fancier EV6 and EV9, which means the EV5 charges at an unremarkable 150kW. Even then, that’s only a peak figure, and average charging speeds are much lower, so you can expect a 10 to 80 per cent charge to take a rather leisurely 39 minutes in the long-range model, and 28 in the standard-range. In that time, the former will gain around 137 miles of range, while the latter will add just 98.

If those figures don’t impress, then the PV5’s road manners surely will. This is a really surprising car to drive, because when you climb aboard and sit up tall in that high-mounted driver’s seat, you expect something of an agricultural driving experience, as befits a car derived from a commercial vehicle.

What you get instead is something far more serene and sophisticated. The suspension has been set up to deliver a comfortable ride, and it feels like a lot of work has gone into ensuring it does so. The PV5 does a remarkable job of glossing over bumps and damping out ruts, so much so that it’s easy to forget you’re in a van.

Yet this softness hasn’t come at the expense of body control. Indeed, around corners the PV5 stays stable and upright even at moderate speeds, helped by the low centre of gravity that comes with a floor-mounted battery. Only when you’re really pushing it hard – in a way most PV5 owners never will – does it start to lean over and become unsettled.

At motorway speeds, the PV5 cruises beautifully, too. There’s a bit of wind noise, but not as much as you might expect from something so tall and boxy – and while acceleration isn’t particularly rapid, especially when you’re fully loaded, the PV5 feels perfectly at home in the fast lane once up to speed.

Technology, equipment & infotainment

There are only two models to choose from. The cheapest and most basic is the Essential, which only gets steel wheels, but otherwise comes reasonably well equipped, with climate control, electric front windows, wireless smartphone mirroring, automatic LED headlights and rain-sensing front wipers.

You don’t get lumbar adjustment on the driver’s seat, however, which means it’s harder to get comfortable. For these features you need to upgrade to the Plus version, only available with the larger battery. This gets a more luxurious vibe in general, with heated front seats, a heated steering wheel, a powered boot lid, electrically adjustable front seats, and alloy wheels.

Whichever model you choose, you have to make do with an interior that majors on cheap-looking grey plastic. This is partly to be expected, to be fair; after all, the PV5 is derived from a commercial vehicle, so it’s no surprise that its interior should feel a little utilitarian.

What’s more disappointing is that Kia seems to have given up its commitment to the usability of physical controls in the PV5. There are very few buttons, and instead most of the major functions have to be controlled through the central touchscreen, which is a pity as it’s inevitably more distracting.

This isn’t a bad system – it’s certainly better than the one you’ll find in a Citroen e-Spacetourer, for example – but neither is it the best. The fact it has so many functions to control doesn’t help, and the menu system feels sprawling as a consequence, so it can be hard to remember where to find the function you want. This disappointing usability is compounded by the fact the system can often be slow to respond to your inputs, leaving you waiting for it to catch up.

On the plus side, the climate functions are at least controlled by an always-on ‘taskbar’, which stays put even when you’re using smartphone mirroring – so if you want to adjust the temperature, it isn’t too much of a faff.

Kia PV5 Passenger running costs

It’s on price that the PV5 scores the biggest win of all. You see, for the entry-level Essential Standard Range, you’ll only pay around £33,000. And put simply, for that price, no other electric car even comes close to offering the sort of space and versatility the PV5 can.

Even a top-spec Plus Long Range with the heat pump option box ticked remains below the £40,000 mark, meaning it doesn’t even incur the ‘luxury car’ VED surcharge applied above that threshold. As a result, the PV5 is not only cheap to buy, but cheap to tax too.

To put the sheer value in context, even the most affordable Volkswagen ID.Buzz will set you back more than £60,000. Granted, it gets 30 miles more of electric range – but is that really worth paying more than £20,000 extra for?

The PV5’s official energy consumption is just 3.2mi/kWh, and you can expect much less on a long run. Mind you, by the standards of its rivals, the PV5 is roughly on a par, and given the PV5’s shape closely approximates that of a house brick, and it therefore cleaves the air with all the finesse of a cow attempting embroidery, it would probably be unrealistic to expect much more.

Servicing is required every two years or 20,000 miles, whichever comes up first. Keep in mind, however, that in common with other Kia and Hyundai EVs, servicing costs can be pricier than some electric rivals’.

Kia PV5 Passenger reliability

There isn’t much we can tell you about the PV5’s reliability yet; it simply hasn’t been out for long enough. What we can tell you, however, is that Kia has a generally pretty solid reputation for reliability, and that’s backed up by a seven-year, 100,000-mile warranty as standard. That’s pretty good, but don’t forget that Toyota offers an even longer warranty (of up to 10 years and 100,000 miles if you always have it serviced at a Toyota dealership) on its ProAce Verso.