Am I DISAPPOINTED by the MPG of the new 2026 Hyundai Palisade hybrid?
We’re in the new Palisade hybrid, a first ever hybrid for the Palisad. And this I know the Monrroni sticker is a little shredded. I apologize for that. But this thing is rated in the calligraphy trim. All-wheel drive with the biggest wheels, 21in wheels at 29 m per gallon combined. 30 on the highway, 29 in the city. Now, let’s turn off volume knob. Genius. Quickly be able to adjust the volume. I put about 255 miles on this. I’m going to put some more miles on it. By the time we get to the gas station, the clock is reading 31 m per gallon. We’ve been getting better than what’s advertised. All right, but that’s according to the clock. Sometimes the clocks are very accurate. Sometimes they’re way off. And that’s why I’m going to fill this up and validate what kind of fuel econom. Now, there are always some errors. You can still get some errors when filling up with the tank and then doing it, you know, your miles divided by gallons. For example, pump different pumps can uh switch off at different times. Um, you know, depending on how fast it’s filling, it might cut off sooner. You know, there are all sorts of different ways to in insert potential error. However, I’m a simple guy. I go to the first pump, uh, first click, and then I go to the second click after waiting a little bit, and then I’m done. I do that all the time. All right, so let’s head to the gas station. But by the time we get there, you’re going to have a good idea of what this hybrid is like to drive, to live with. Okay, I’ve put over 10 and a half hours of butt time here in the Palisade this week. Uh, doing lots of kids shuttling to school and back. They’re now on fall break. I have a couple with me. They wanted to to be along for the review. Girls, say hi. Hi. Okay. Now, girls, what what fuel economy do you think we’re going to get? I’ll give you uh two options to make it simple. Do you think we’re going to get 27 miles per gallon or do you think we’re going to get 33 miles per gallon? 33. They both said 33 miles per gallon. All right. Well, we’ll figure out how close they are once we fill up. There’s a Cyber Truck. Let’s pull out in front of it. Show them some hybrid power. So much power and torque right off the get. And that’s not going to help my fuel economy. But just keep in mind like this has all the power I could ever want or need really for for a kid hauler. 329 horsepower, 339 pound- feet of torque. And it’s most of the time super duper quiet. Really quiet. I often don’t know when the engine is on or off. If I’m accelerating, yes, I’ll know. I’ll hear the engine a little bit. And it’s nice compared to most hybrids that have ECVTs. You’ll get droneyiness or whininess of the engine while accelerating. Not here in the Palisade because the the engine works through a six-speed automatic in tandem with an electric motor. All right? Or should I say two electric motors. Or you have a small motor generator to turn to turn on the engine. A little bit of regen, but that kind of powers your accessories in the car. such as air conditioning, things like that. Um, and then you have a larger drive motor that powers the front wheels. Now, there is mechanical all-wheel drive, which is going to sap some fuel economy. That’s why the front-wheel drive Palisades get way better fuel economy, up to 35 m per gallon, at least that’s advertised. I’d love to test a front-wheel drive Palisade with the 18-in wheels on the seal trim to see how far I can stretch that fuel economy. All right. But, you know, in in press cars that I get, they’re always like almost always maxed out. They give you the top trim so people can see, okay, I can live with or without, you know, the ventilated seats, which are great in here, or I can live with or without the massaging seat, which is pretty good, or or the panel roof. Like, I do love all the features in here. It’s been quite nice. And I’ve said this since I drove this vehicle for the first time a couple weeks ago in Austin. It’s like this gives me all the luxury I could want, but it costs 15 20 grand less than luxury competitors such as the XC90. Um, when you go, you know, power punch for punch or something like the even the Genesis lineup, which is Hyundai’s luxury division, you have something like the GV80, which you give a lot more performance with a twin turbo V6, but that returns like 17 m a gallon. This is roughly doubled the fuel economy, yet giving me all the features and amenities that I really had. Maybe not airr ride suspension or something like that and some of the luxury players, but the ride quality in here is fantastic. I don’t feel like I’m lacking for anything. All right. So, it is an incredibly executed vehicle, but can it also execute when I fill it up at the pump? So, let’s go ahead and get to the gas station and find out what the results are. All right, we made it to the gas station. The gas cap’s on the left hand side. If you guys have been living under a rock, it’s okay. one way to figure out the best way to figure out where your gas cap is is the little um gas tank on your car and wherever the arrow is pointed to on that gas tank is where your gas cap is. All right, so the car says I have 255 miles left and now it’s down to 30.8 miles per gallon. What I’ve noticed this week is that it takes a while for your fuel economy to uh get up. Um meaning it seems to have a long warm-up uh time period when you drive the car. So if you’re driving short stance in your Palisade hybrid, your fuel economy might not be very good. At least what it’s been telling me. I typically have to drive it for about 15 20 minutes to start seeing that fuel economy go from about 25 m per gallon up to 30 m per gallon. I don’t know if it needs the battery needs to warm up or the engine needs to warm up. Not quite sure why there’s such a big delay on how it’s calculating fuel economy. Um or at least on how it’s calculating good fuel economy. All right, so let’s go and fill up and figure out the sort of range and fuel economy we’ve been getting this week in the Palisade hybrid. We put 8.7 gallons in it and it does take regular fuel, which is quite nice. This is one busy gas station, so we’re going to get out of the way. Um, find a a pretty chill spot to sit down and calculate the fuel economy here. Um, there is a button right here to open the gas cap and then it gives you a little indication on the the mid to let you know that your gas cap is open. So, I like that. Um, and there was surprisingly very little information inside the gas cap area. It didn’t say like uh octane and maybe because it’s a pre-production model. I’m not quite sure. It said for me to like check out my the manual of the car and also said something like 20 minutes for fillup. I’m not quite sure what that all meant meant, but um let’s go and park in the Taco Bell Culver’s parking lot here and uh calculate what our fuel economy is going to be or has been. So 263 miles divided by 8 uh 727. All right, so it’s exactly 30 miles per gallon. A little over 30 m per gallon after filling up the Palisad hybrid. Impressive for well over 300 horsepower, well over 300 lb feet of torque. Now, you know, would I want better fuel economy? Of course. And you can get it. Get the 18 wheel. Sorry, 18inch wheel, not 18 wheeler, 18-inch wheel. Seal um or seal. I think convenience is the next step up. The Limited gives you bigger wheels, 18 inch or sorry, 20-inch wheels, and this calligraphy gives you 21inch wheels. So, this is pretty good results. I out I beat out what the the rated fuel economy is. And that’s also while sitting in carline a lot idling this thing running AC for probably out of the the 10 and a half hours I’ve been here probably an hour hour and a half of that was just sitting idling um in in car line. Okay. So there’s a a Mazda CX90 a direct competitor to this. Um, it’s just not nearly as fun to drive as the Mazda, but it’s also has better fuel economy, unless you get the plug-in hybrid, but the plug-in hybrid’s really heavy feeling and the Mazda and it takes away its best attribute, which is it’s great handling and it’s fun to drive nature versus the inline 6. However, yeah, watch my reviews on the Mazda. I seeing one, it makes me uh now I have the parking thing going off. Seeing the Mazda CX90, of course, as a direct rival of this, I’m going to go off on a tangent. It’s also a very, very good vehicle. I think overall this is a better executed vehicle, and it hurts me to say because the Mazda is more fun to drive, but this seems far more refined from a powertrain perspective, a ride quality perspective. Um, and it is extra execution perspective, I enjoy being in this vehicle over the Mazda. All right. So, I’ll see you guys in the comments. Did that surprise you? That fuel economy. Uh, were you expecting better? Uh, you know, I didn’t I don’t I didn’t know what to expect. This is an allnew hybrid setup for Hyundai. Um, with this two motor hybrid setup. Before they were just using a single motor hybrid. They have used uh six-speed automatics in the past, but this is all new. The the transmission’s new, the the two motors are new. Okay. Um, so it’s all new and they did a great job. 30 miles per gallon. And guys, I’ve been pushing this vehicle pretty hard at times, too. So, I haven’t been feathering the throttle like I do typically when I’m in a Sienna because that vehicle’s slow as it is. And when you get into the throttle in like something like a Sienna or a Grand Highlander hybrid and they just yell at you. The engine’s loud. Yes, you’re getting good fuel economy, but they’re slow and whiny. All right, so this thing it kind of blends amazing fuel economy and amazing performance and amazing luxury with the smoothness and quietness of this powertrain. All right, I got to end it there. I’ll see you guys in the comments. Stay tuned for more fuel economy tests. I love doing fuel economy cat tests. I really geek out. I nerd out over that stuff. So you if you guys enjoy that anytime I get a hybrid, especially if I’m testing it for the first time, I like doing these tests to see what my real world fuel economy is. It’s always going to be different depending on your driving behavior, your geography. Um, I live in South Florida. It’s flat and warm here most of the time. So, my fuel economy is probably going to be better than most parts of the country. However, I do run AC quite hard and that does take away from fuel economy. Thank you guys for watching. Stay tuned. The girls are close. Girls, you said 33 m per gallon and the other option was 27 miles per gallon, right? Well, you’re you you won because it was 30 miles per gallon, which is right in the middle. Okay, so you still win. Nice job. We’ll catch you in the next one.
#hybrid #mpg #hyundai #palisade
I blew threw hundreds of miles to discover the new 2026 Palisade’s true “hybrid” fuel economy. Here are my results.
New, powerful, and efficient internal-combustion and hybrid powertrains
The 2026 Palisade offers two new powertrain options. The internal-combustion powertrain boasts a newly developed 3.5-liter V6 making up to 287 horsepower and up to 260 lb.-ft. of torque. The direct-injected engine is coupled to an 8-speed automatic transmission with a two-chamber torque converter. This standard ICE powertrain is available in both two-wheel and HTRAC® all-wheel-drive configurations. This naturally-aspirated V6 is targeting a robust 5,000-pound maximum towing capacity8, giving active families the flexibility to haul a variety of weekend toys, including campers, boats, and powersports equipment.
For 2026, a hybrid option joins the Palisade powertrain portfolio for the first time. It features a 2.5-liter turbocharged in-line four-cylinder engine putting out up to an estimated 258 horsepower. Two electric motors mounted in the six-speed automatic transmission’s case provide additional tractive force for a combined total estimated system output of up to 329 horsepower and up to 339 pound-feet of torque (both estimated). Palisade HEV’s high-efficiency powertrain is expected to achieve up to 34 mpg combined, yielding an internally targeted range of up to 619 miles1. The hybrid powertrain also offers an estimated 4,000 lbs. of maximum towing capacity8, all of which combine for supreme driver confidence and flexibility out on the open road. Specific features have been added to the hybrid to provide a more EV-like ownership experience, including a new Stay Mode function that monitors the battery system when parked to allow for extended use of the infotainment and HVAC functions.
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