► First pictures of new Sportage
► It’s the fourth-generation SUV
► Expect in showrooms early 2016
Kia has issued these first official photographs of its new, fourth-generation Sportage crossover ahead of its world debut at the 2015 Frankfurt motor show. No technical details have been issued yet – just three photographs, in response to earlier leaked images ahead of the Koreans’ planned roll-out.
So we can only comment on the look of its new 2016 Sportage, which is sleeker and a trifle fussier at the front, where the tiger-nostril nose has been turned up to 11. The headlamps are positioned higher up away from the grille, now bleeding into the bonnet; note the ice-cube quartet of driving lamps; the newcomer’s wheelbase is longer; and the overhangs front and rear are shorter, says Kia, for a more athletic stance.
The design emanates from the Koreans’ European design centre in Frankfurt, Germany, which led the project, with input from Kia’s studios in Korea and California; on this first evidence we’d say the new 2016 Sportage seems to have diluted the glitzy, very Europeanised style of its predecessor – one of the smartest mainstream SUVs we can think of.
Check out the new Sportage caught in our spy photos here.
New Sportage: design influences
Ealier in summer 2015, Kia issued design renderings of the new Sportage, suggesting it would follow the design cues of the recent KX3 concept car. The company says the interior, previewed in this design preview, is its ‘most refined, high-quality cabin yet.’
See the new Sportage in the metal on 15 September 2015 at the Frankfurt car show. CAR magazine will be reporting live from the IAA.