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When you have a conversation about electric vehicles, range anxiety almost always comes up. It’s the fear that an EV’s battery might run out before reaching a charger, leaving its driver stranded with a big, dead battery and a big, expensive towing bill.

But in a year of actually owning a 2024 Kia EV6, my family’s been dealing with a different kind of anxiety: mileage-limit anxiety on our lease. Basically, we drive the damn thing way too much.

After driving about 15,000 miles in a year, we’re almost certainly going to exceed the 20,000 miles allocated for our two-year lease. And like any lease, that’s probably going to mean a financial penalty when I turn it in. But it’s proof of how much we liked the EV6—my first all-electric car, and my wife’s as well—and how much it made us not want to drive our gas-powered Mazda 3 hatchback anymore. 

If that’s the only anxiety I’m dealing with after 12 months, I’d say it makes a good case for an electric future.

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

As a quick recap, last August, I leased a 2024 Kia EV6 Wind for two years. It’s the dual-motor all-wheel-drive model with a 77.4 kWh battery, rated by the EPA for 282 miles of range. It comes well-equipped—though not as feature-packed as the GT-Line or the high-performance GT. I paid for it myself, with no special treatment or perks from Kia or the upstate New York dealer.

For a while, I was in the habit of writing monthly dispatches about owning the EV6. But then I got busier at work. I had places to go and other cars to test. Sometimes I’d go weeks without driving the EV6, while my wife made it her primary daily. 

And yet I keep going back to it. (Not just because I need it to get around, either.) I drive everything from middling broken-promise EVs to high-test stuff I’d buy tomorrow if I had a winning Powerball ticket. Through all of that, every time I drive the EV6, I think that I’d buy this car all over again if I had the chance. 

But not everything about Kia’s allegedly Lancia Stratos-inspired family crossover has been perfect. Here’s my assessment of this car, both good and bad, after a year of driving. 

Charging Is Like Stopping For Gas

2024 Kia EV6 Charging

Photo by: Patrick George

When I went shopping for an EV, I knew it was between the Kia EV6 and the Hyundai Ioniq 5. I would’ve been happy with either, but I went with the Kia because I found a better deal on one that was closer to me. 

The reason was charging. As someone who drives a lot of EVs, I’ve always been blown away by the class-leading charging times of Hyundai’s E-GMP platform. On a 350-kilowatt DC fast-charger, these cars will go from 10% to 80% in about 18-20 minutes. They’ll hit a max charging speed of around 225 kW.

That puts these supposedly humble Hyundais and Kias among the fastest-charging EVs you can buy, ranking among the Porsches and Lucids of the world. Even using a Tesla Supercharger means going from a low charge to 80% in a little under 30 minutes. 

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

Route-planning on these cars is excellent, by the way. You tell the navigation system where you need to go, and it tells you where to stop and for how long, along with some choices of chargers if either you or the car finds a faster option. 

Most of the time, my fast-charging experiences—which I don’t do often because we have a home charger—are around 10 minutes, if not less. I take what I need from the charger and go. Sometimes that’s 80%, sometimes it’s less. It’s no different from a stop for gas, plus maybe a bathroom break.

Forget what you’ve heard. There’s no “waiting hours to charge” for me. 

Do I wish the car had a native Tesla-style North American Charging Standard (NACS) plug like the newer EV6 does? It hasn’t been a big deal that I don’t, especially when you can stuff a NACS adapter into your frunk.  

Range Is Excellent, But Subjective

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

Newer E-GMP cars give you a “maximum range” and “minimum range” reading, as well as a primary one. I think that’s a great feature. That’s because, as it is, the EV6’s range readings can be all over the place.

I usually charge my car to 80% unless I’m facing a longer road trip. Sometimes that can read as high as 280 miles; other times it’s 260 miles. Sometimes, it’s around 240 or even 220. This makes sense when you consider that range estimates are based on a number of factors, including the weather or your most recent driving habits; a long stint on the highway at 80 mph will yield a lower max range rating later on.

Many other EVs I’ve tested don’t work this way, and seem to truly read at their maximum range rating when charged to 100% (or 80%, in this case). But I am confident in saying that even as a dual-motor car, the EV6 is good for around 300 miles per charge when the weather is temperate. And when you get 300 miles, you worry about range a lot less than you thought you would. 

My efficiency is excellent as well. I average between 2.5 and 3.0 miles per kilowatt hour in the winter, and well over 4.0 miles per kWh in the summertime. 

Maintenance? What Maintenance? 

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

Man, I don’t miss going to a mechanic and having some guy tell me that some engine component I’ve barely even heard of is busted, and fixing it means I get to help send his kids to an Ivy League college. The most “maintenance” I’ve done on the EV6 has been two tire rotations and a top-off of windshield wiper fluid. So under $150 in a year, if that. 

What about other savings? According to insights from Recurrent, I’ve saved about 663 gallons of gas as of this writing. At $3.158 for regular unleaded here in New York state, that’s more than $2,000 in a year. At most, I’ve probably spent about $250 on various fast-charging sessions, including at Tesla Superchargers. That means my ChargePoint Home Flex Level 2 charger has already paid for itself, including installation costs. 

I don’t think you should buy an EV just to save money on gas, because there are other costs involved, like a still-higher transaction price and whatever you’ll pay for public or home charging. But I do not miss getting gasoline, that’s for sure. 

V2L Will Be A Must-Have Feature Someday

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

Remember when I made a pot of coffee with my car during a winter blackout? I don’t use the EV6’s included vehicle-to-load adapter all that often. But this feature is amazingly clutch to have when you need it. (In fact, my wife was floored when she learned recently that not all EVs can do this.)

The Kia EV9 is even designed to power your entire house for up to three days, when you use the proper equipment for it. I thankfully haven’t had a use case that extreme. But I do want to get some setup where I can keep some home circuits powered by the car in the event of an outage. The lesson is this: when you get a car whose power source can do more than just drive the wheels, you won’t want to go back. 

The Performance Trounces Any Comparable Gas Car

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

The Wind AWD EV6 is rated to do zero to 60 in 5.1 seconds. That makes it about the quickest car I’ve ever owned, roughly tied by the tuned Subaru WRX I drove when I was younger. But in day-to-day applications, this car is incredibly quick and delightfully good at passing. My favorite thing to do is to slam it into Sport Mode mid-pass and then let my unsuspecting passengers feel that rush of instant torque.

Yeah, show me a gas-powered family crossover at this price tag that can keep up. I can wait.

Some Of The Technology Is Excellent. Some Of It… Not So Much

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

The EV6’s voice controls are among the best out there. In terms of speech recognition, turning vague navigation asks into concrete addresses, and just generally doing what I ask it to do, the car excels. The same goes for the EV-focused features like charging management, charger-finding and route-planning. 

In other ways, it’s showing its age. The EV6’s infotainment system feels on par with any standard gas-powered Kia, just with some thoughtful EV-focused features thrown in. In terms of speed, customization and in-car apps, it lags behind any of the Android Automotive and Google Built-In systems I’ve tested on cars like the Polestar 2, Volvo EX40, Chevrolet Equinox EV, and Cadillac Optiq.

My car also has a hands-on radar cruise control with highway lane-change assist, which is nice, but Kia and Hyundai offer nothing that’s on par with General Motors’ Super Cruise or Ford’s BlueCruise. I hope that changes someday. 

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

And if you want over-the-air software updates that add new features all the time, get a Tesla or a Rivian. Kia, and the wider Hyundai Motor Group, feel pretty behind the curve in that regard. We EV6 owners get a few navigation system updates and bug fixes here and there, but that’s about it. 

Also, my Kia Connect Subscription expired after a year. I can no longer use my iPhone to remotely start and lock the car, precondition the climate or manage other features. That system is $200 per year. But the app is so slow and laggy that I’m not inclined to spend the money.

The Hyundai Motor Group has ambitious plans to charge customers for software features, but it needs to improve its offerings before that can happen.

It’s A Fog Machine

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

Here’s a weird EV6 quirk: that row of buttons below the air vents that doubles as a climate control system and shortcuts to other features, like the map and navigation systems. I don’t think that flipping between the two with that little arrow function is a great design, but it’s no dealbreaker.

My bigger problem is that somehow, the climate controls on this car—especially on automatic mode, which is ideal for efficiency—can never keep the front windows from fogging up in the winter. It’s unbelievably frustrating. As one forum owner put it, “My RWD Long Range EV6 is the foggiest vehicle I’ve owned in 50 years of driving.” Make mine 20 instead of 50 and I’m right there with you, bud. 

If anyone knows the solution to this, email me. I’ll owe you a round of drinks. Seriously.  

About Those Door Handles…

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

Like a lot of EVs, the EV6’s door handles are flush against the car’s body for ostensible efficiency and aerodynamic reasons. On my vintage of EV6, they pop out automatically when you unlock the car, provided you’re driving a GT or GT-Line car. I do not, so I’m stuck having to shove them real hard into the door to lock or unlock the car—no gentle tap on this thing—or having to pull them out every time I want to get inside it. 

Luckily, Kia fixed this problem. All newer EV6s include power-popping door handles. I wish my car did that.

Verdict: America’s Most Underrated EV

2024 Kia EV6

Photo by: Patrick George

I’ve come to think of the EV6 as being perhaps America’s most underrated electric car. While the EV6 runs the same hardware as the Ioniq 5, Hyundai’s car outsold the Kia more than two-to-one in 2024, and the gap has only widened this year.

I can’t say why. Maybe it’s the EV6’s unconventional, almost wagon-like body, or the fact that the newer Tesla-plug-equipped EV6 took a while to hit showrooms in 2025. (And Tesla probably sells about as many Model Ys in a week as the EV6 has year-to-date.) Sometimes, I can’t help but wonder whether Kia would’ve had more success leading with the far more conventional-looking Kia EV5 than my glacial gray wonder-wedge. 

But I still love this thing. I never get tired of driving it. It hits the right mix of performance, range, charging and capability for my family. And even if it’s not the best EV out there, aspects of it routinely outclass far more expensive EVs. 

Remember: the only real headaches I’ve had here, if you can call them that, are window fog, door handles and a smartphone app from the wrong decade. Those aren’t even really EV problems. They could be issues on any gas car, too.

No wonder folks who go electric don’t go back.

What will I do with the EV6 next year, when my lease ends and I have to say goodbye or buy it out? I know its purchase price will be below what it’s actually worth, thanks to EV depreciation. I have time to figure it out. Until then, I have miles to go in this Kia, and I look forward to all of them.

Contact the author: patrick.george@insideevs.com