Report: 2026 Will Be the Kia Niro EV’s Final Year Kia
The Niro Hybrid has been refreshed in South Korea, but it’s unclear if this updated model will make its way stateside.
If it does, we expect the Niro to continue with its traditional hybrid and plug-in hybrid powertrains.
Kia’s electric lineup in the United States is starting to shrink. First, the EV4 sedan was delayed indefinitely before it even arrived. Then the EV9 GT was postponed and the EV6 GT did not return for the 2026 model year. Now one of Kia’s existing EVs appears to be biting the dust too. Company executives have told The Korea Herald that the Niro EV has been discontinued, which was also reported by InsideEVs.
“The Niro EV, which had been produced until the previous model, has been discontinued,” Jung Yoon-kyung, a senior marketing manager at Kia, told The Korea Herald. “We plan to sell the remaining inventory available.”
We have reached out to Kia for confirmation and will update this story when we receive a response.
Marc Urbano – Car and Driver
Kia revealed a refreshed version of the Niro for the Korea market in January, but at the time the automaker divulged no details about the powertrain. Both generations of the Niro so far have been offered in traditional hybrid, plug-in hybrid, and full EV versions. Now it appears that the facelifted model, which sports a cleaner design that is more in line with the rest of Kia’s current lineup, will continue with just the hybrid and PHEV variants.
The Niro EV’s death is not all that surprising. The powertrain featured a single electric motor producing 201 horsepower, while the 64.8-kWh battery pack provided an EPA-estimated range of 253 miles. With a starting price of $41,195, the Niro EV was more expensive for the 2026 model year than compact EV SUVs such as the Hyundai Ioniq 5, which is built on a dedicated EV platform and starts at just $36,600 after a substantial price cut this year.
Marc Urbano – Car and Driver
While the base Ioniq 5 has less impressive figures than the Niro EV, the Ioniq 5 SEL starts just a few hundred dollars higher than the Niro, is more spacious, has 24 more horsepower, and has a 318-mile estimated range. And there’s even stronger competition in the form of the Tesla Model Y Standard, which starts at $41,630, produces close to 300 horsepower, and offers 321 miles of range. The Niro EV is also built in South Korea, subjecting it to the Trump administration’s import tariff, something the Ioniq 5 and its Kia counterpart, the EV6, avoid by being assembled in Ellabell, Georgia.
The fate of the Niro EV also leads us to question what will happen to its corporate cousin, the Hyundai Kona Electric. Last month, Hyundai confirmed that the Kona Electric would skip the 2026 model year and return for 2027, but if the Niro EV is dead, we wouldn’t be shocked to see the Kona Electric’s hiatus become permanent.
Kia has yet to announce whether the refreshed Niro is coming to the United States, but if it does, we expect it to arrive for the 2027 model year and go on sale toward the end of 2026 with hybrid and plug-in hybrid setups.
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