Say what you want about Hyundai, but the brand has been on a design roll. From the Kia EV9 to the whole Genesis lineup, Hyundai continues to wow for the masses. That design winning streak continues into the 2024 model year with the new Elantra and Sonata sedans.
After receiving a ground-up redesign for 2020, Hyundai has heavily updated the Sonata for 2024. Hyundai calls the design “aggressive” and its “sportiest” ever, and I’d have to agree. Up front, the Sonata wears a light bar that runs the width of the car. Hyundai calls this a “Horizon Lamp.” Under that are the main headlights with a new grille with large air intakes.
Out back, there’s a new tail lamp design Hyundai calls “H-Lights” with a middle light that runs the width of the trunk, which also wears a small spoiler. At the bottom bumper, though, Hyundai unfortunately continues an annoying industry design trend of applying exhaust shaped designs. Fortunately the sporty N-Line trim wears quad exhaust to fill those designs; we’ll have to wait and see how lower trims work with that bumper treatment.
The interior has seen a redesign as well. There’s a new driver focused, futuristic layout enhanced by a “floating” design theme, and dual curved 12.3 inch displays for the center stack and driver.
On the performance front, the Sonata loses the 1.6-liter turbocharged engine. Buyers can now choose between a standard 2.5-liter I4, a turbocharged version of the same engine that’s only available on the N-Line, or a 2.0-liter hybrid engine. All-wheel drive is also available as a new option, but only with the 2.5-liter engine. The N-Line gets performance enhancements, a couple of which seem to be taken from the N models. The N-Line now has active sound design (fancy automotive speak for piped in artificial engine noise), launch control, N power shift and rev matching.
The Elantra’s updates aren’t as dramatic as the Sonata’s. Hyundai designers were more plastic surgeons with the Elantra’s update, stretching and tightening the cars already existing design. The result is a front fascia with thinner headlights and LED DRLs, a split grille with a body color bar running through it, and H shaped rear tail lights. The interior is largely the same. Aside from new features like a rear armrest, cup holders and rear charging ports on the Elantra N (something that had been keeping me from pulling the trigger on one for a a while now), the bigger updates are to the Elantra N and the Elantra’s color choices.
The Elantra N sees ride and handling enhancements for ‘24. There are things like hardware updates to the heavily customizable suspension settings, G bushing reinforcements for more precise steering, sturdier engine mounts and a change to the rear suspension insulator for better damping. There’s also a new wheel design for the 19-inch wheels.
The color choices are, in my opinion, a big deal. Buyers can choose Exotic Green or Ultimate Red, but there are also two new grays, one of which looks like it’s pulled straight from Genesis. Amazon Grey is a matte like color that’s available on every trim except for the Elantra N. And at the price point the Elantra starts at, it’s honestly an impressive color.
Hyundai hasn’t said anything about pricing, but the 2024 Elantra is set to go on sale this fall, followed by the 2024 Sonata in the winter.
