The Hyundai Ioniq 5

• The Hyundai Ioniq 5 (and many other EVs) have a drive mode specifically made for snowy driving.
• Snow mode dulls throttle inputs and reduces regenerative braking to prevent wheels from locking up.
• If equipped, Hyundai’s snow mode also locks AWD in a 50-50 split. 

People say electric cars can’t handle the winter, but the best car I’ve ever driven in snow was electric.

That car was my now-departed 2012 Mitsubishi i-MiEV. Slow, rear-wheel-drive with narrow tires and a very low-mounted and hefty battery, the i-MiEV’s almost Volkswagen Beetle-grade specs made it unstoppable in snow.

It wasn’t fast, the heater was trash, but its ability to drive with complete confidence even through large snow drifts that stopped the average all-wheel-drive compact crossover dead in its tracks was unrivaled.

But not every electric car can do that, though. I’ve lived in Ohio my entire life, and I’ve driven plenty of electric or electrified cars through the winter. Some are better than others, most are about as average as they come when it comes to any given car on all-season tires.

However, this week, a new Hyundai Ioniq 5 in Snow Mode during a heavy snow storm quickly rocketed to the top of my list of “good snow cars.”

Better than my old i-MiEV, although that’s probably because the Ioniq 5’s heater actually works.

What is Snow Mode?

See, traction management is the name of the game when it comes to snow driving. Modern EVs are generally very, very fast vehicles with lots of power; even the “slow” ones have horsepower counts that challenge high-end sports cars many of us grew up with. And, unlike a gas engine, all that power and torque is available as soon as you hit the pedal.

It’s glorious to experience sub-5-second 0-60 times in the dry, but that’s not ideal in inclement weather. Naturally, with all that power, it’s really, really easy to spin the hell out of the wheels. Thus, power and traction management are necessary to make sure we don’t kill ourselves when the going gets tough. This level of power has caused some to insist that maybe electric cars won’t handle snow quite as well.

For Hyundai, Kia, and Genesis products, the brands have what’s called “Snow Mode” in their main drive mode settings.

In Snow Mode, the car significantly eases all throttle inputs, smoothing them out and reducing the likelihood that you’ll spin the wheels and break traction. The regenerative braking is turned down to avoid any sort of wheel lock when decelerating, and it can’t be adjusted unless you exit snow mode. If the car is AWD, the AWD system is locked into 50-50 mode for traction.

I have to say, it works. This week, the Central Ohio area was hit with a snowstorm so heavy that it canceled school for most school systems in my area. The news cycle was dominated by all the car accidents.

And yet, the Ioniq 5 handled the weather like a champ. The unit that Hyundai sent me that week only had all-season tires, so traction inherently isn’t as strong as a car with dedicated snow tires. But the Ioniq was a mountain goat. It seldom broke traction, and I had no issue maintaining control on ice and snow. I could have driven all day in the nasty conditions if I needed to.

Photo by: Kevin Williams/InsideEVs

Thankfully, cars made by Hyundai Motor Group aren’t the only electric cars that have a dedicated snow mode. Pop behind the wheel of nearly every General Motors electric car or any Nissan, and they’ll also have a snow drive mode, which operates using the same principles as Hyundai’s system. Tesla has a Slippery Surface traction mode, but that’s designed to allow the car to spin its wheels to get unstuck, rather than maintain stable traction in bad weather.

As always, consult your manual and invest in snow tires if you think it’s the safest option. Patrick George wrote this last year as well: dual-motor AWD is great, but there are circumstances where the right kind of rubber is the best way to go.

But don’t believe anyone who says electric cars aren’t good in snow. That’s a lie; they’re great. If anything, they’re the best on the road. 

Contact the author: kevin.williams@insideevs.com