It’s all the sedan that many buyers need, but at a price nearly anyone can afford
Be it ever so humble, there’s no car like a small car for squirting through traffic, claiming impossibly tight parking spots and avoiding gas-station pit stops.
The fifth-generation Hyundai Accent delivers these and other benefits, while ensuring your bank account doesn’t suffer from overdrawn-itis.
The Accent has been Hyundai’s answer for modestly priced transportation for many years and the 2018 edition (sedan only, at least for now) maintains that tradition. Accents make excellent first-time acquisitions for those starting out on life’s winding highway, as well as for commuters and around-town drivers who can easily do without piloting some overstuffed cruiser or a big and tall wagon.
Add to that the Accent’s robust five-year comprehensive warranty and it becomes a sound alternative to buying some used vehicle of uncertain provenance.
Having said that, the Accent is far from being a tortuous penalty box for adult-sized folk. The car’s surprisingly spacious passenger compartment places it solidly in the compact-car class (as opposed to the subcompact group). In fact, the Accent delivers as much or greater cabin and trunk volume than any similarly sized sedan. Entry and exit for rear-seat riders is comparable to larger cars, owing to a tall roofline and wide doors.
Visually, the new Accent looks so much like the slightly larger Elantra sedan that, from not too great a distance, you could easily confuse the two.
The Accent is about a half-inch longer than the 2017 version, while width has increased by more than an inch. That’s not a huge change, but every little bit helps.
As with the Kia Rio (also new for 2018, and a Hyundai subset), the Accent uses a new platform that’s less prone to bending and twisting for a more stable and quieter ride. The suspension has been retuned and Hyundai claims the new variable-ratio steering rack is more precise.
There’s greater refinement, including a smart-looking dashboard and control panel that are both as straightforward as you can get. The base car’s minimalist 5-inch display does leave the interior looking a bit barren, but an available 7-inch screen fills things out quite nicely.
The Accent’s 1.6-liter four-cylinder engine puts out 130 horsepower and 119 pound-feet of torque. Those numbers are down somewhat from the previous model’s 138/121 rating. Hyundai says the redesigned engine is now more refined and torquier in the lower rev range and is also a bit less thirsty, with a combined city/highway
fuel-economy rating of 32 mpg (up two mpg from 2017).
A six-speed manual transmission is standard in the base Accent SE, while a six-speed automatic is optional for that trim, but standard with the mid-level SEL and top-line Limited.
For the grand sum of $15,900, with destination charges included, the SE allows frugal buyers to enjoy a nonbasic life. They get air conditioning, six-way adjustable driver’s seat, splitfolding rear seat, four-speaker audio plus the usual power-functioning items.
The SEL swaps out SE’s 15-inch steel wheels for alloys, the rear drum brakes for discs and the smaller touchscreen for the larger version. Also added are heated outside mirrors, a sliding floor console armrest plus a few other niceties.
The top-end Limited comes with climate control, power sunroof, heated front seats, pushbutton start, hands-free trunk opening and 17-inch wheels.
You also get minimal active safety tech (forward collision intervention and blind-spot monitoring) in the Limited, but that falls well short of what’s offered by the Accent’s chief rivals.
Ultimately, though, the Accent’s ahead-of-the-curve size and its sophistication makes it worthy of consideration.