2025 Hyundai Ioniq 5 N Review: A Racing Sim You Can Drive on the Road

Date June 22, 2025
Category
News
2025 Hyundai Ioniq 5 N Review: A Racing Sim You Can Drive on the Road

It’s easy to go gaga over the 2025 Hyundai Ioniq 5 N on a short backroad blast or rip around a track. It’s mind-blowingly fast and, more impressively, a genuinely unique driving experience. Though I have to admit, I never completely got over the inherent goofiness of fake manual shifting and the video-game interface. I understand why people love this car, but I wasn’t sad when my weeklong test came to a close.

The Basics

A curb weight of 4,861 pounds is a lot—but so is an output of 601 horsepower, which can spike to 641 hp with the 10-second N Grin Boost button. The torque figure of 545 lb-ft also increases to 568 when that button is pushed. Hyundai says the Ioniq 5 N can do a zero-to-60-mph run in 3.25 seconds at maximum attack, but MotorTrend recorded an even more dizzying 2.8-second pull and ran the quarter-mile in 11 seconds flat. In a mass-produced car that can also carry four people and a dog comfortably? That’s crazy talk—but it’s real.

Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, front three-quarter view.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, charger plug.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, steering wheel.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, rear three-quarter view.
Andrew P. Collins

The 5 N’s specs, grip, responsiveness, and real-time customizability have been discussed ad nauseam on podcasts, in reviews, and here on The Drive. It looks great and loads a lot of cargo because, as you’ve also probably read, while it may have the shape of an ’80s rally car, it’s got the footprint of a crossover. Four adults can easily fit, plus luggage. The $70,000 list price is justified, too. A BMW X3 M50 is about the same money, and while that may feel fancier, the Hyundai is far, far quicker. At least, until it runs out of juice, which does happen annoyingly soon. Hyundai’s official max range estimate for this car is 221 miles; expect a bit less if you drive as hard as the car invites you to.

Former The Drive staff writer Chris Rosales (now at Motor1) called out the weak driving range as the 5 N’s “one major flaw,” and yeah, it does make a long day of adventuring less free-wheeling. Where he’s at, at the north end of Angeles Crest Highway in California, you could easily rack up 200 miles bombing canyons. Similar story here in rural New York, where I do my relaxation driving—I can put 100 miles on a car just doing weekend errands.

  • Hyundai Ioniq 5 N interior detail, door handle
    This checker-stripe appears all over the place. But as you can see by the scratches in the door card, the car’s not made of the most elite materials.
  • Hyundai Ioniq 5 N seat stitching
    Seating materials, however, felt excellent.
  • Hyundai Ioniq 5 N cargo bay.
    Rear cargo room is bountiful—this is an SUV, after all.
  • Hyundai Ioniq 5 N door.
    Door handles tuck away when you put the car in drive.
  • Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, backlit interior element.
    The interior door arm rests kind of float on some backlighting.
  • Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, inside of the door.
    Here’s another perspective on that interesting floating interior door trim design.
  • Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, electric motor cover.
    Not much to see under the hood, but at least the motor cover has some decoration on it.
  • Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, rear reflector.
    This has to be one of the most creative reflector designs on any car right now.

When you do need a charge, the car’s supposed to be able to go from 10% to 80% in 18 minutes if you can connect to a 350 kW DC fast charger. A 50 kW DC charger should be able to do it in one hour and 10 minutes. Charging the car to max from 10% on a 240-volt outlet at 10.9 kW would take 7 hours and 20 minutes—even that’s not terrible as long as you can just have it plugged in overnight.

Driving the Ioniq 5 N

The cockpit layout is tidy but not aggressively minimalist, and the sporty seats are taut and supportive. It can be driven in near-silence, but the Ioniq 5 N has no chill. It wants to party. It wants to be driven hard. It might even be too stiff to be practical in some regions. Rough roads felt extremely unforgiving to me, and there are a whole lot of those in the Hudson Valley.

Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, side view.
Andrew P. Collins

I’m not saying the car should be softer. On the contrary, the ride felt very well matched to the vehicle’s vibe and intentions. And while it punishes you in potholes, it does reward you with a good feel for where the car is below you.

Arguably, the 5 N’s best party trick is its customizability. As our former reviews editor Chris Tsui wrote wrote last year after his drive at Laguna Seca: “Eleven driver-selectable, fully variable levels of front-rear torque output mean Ioniq 5 N can go from fully FWD to fully RWD (70 rear, 30 front is the default), while an electronic limited-slip differential and ‘N Drift Optimizer’ function can simulate a clutch-kick to make smoky slides easier.”

I was completely blown away by that idea when I first read about it. Now having now driven it on public roads for an extended period of time, I have some salient thoughts. If you’re a car nerd, you can amuse yourself for hours running the same loop, trying it with different power distribution. You’ll be able to enjoy and appreciate it at socially acceptable speeds, too. The sliding, I have to admit, I simply could not find a place that seemed safe enough to drift. This brings me to another key factor in what this car’s like to drive: You really need to treat it with respect. You can sneeze on the accelerator and warp into the next zip code.

Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, computer screen readout.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, N Grin Boost button.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, computer screen readout.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, computer screen readout.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, computer screen readout.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, computer screen readout.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, fake digital tach.
An EV that’s idling? It’s not really, but it’s a weirdly impressive imitation. The other images here are just to give you a sense of how deep you can go in the car’s customization menu. If you like to tinker with settings, you’re going to love this car. Andrew P. Collins

But I’m happy to confirm that, unlike with some modern performance vehicles, you don’t need to drive this thing like you’re in a Mission: Impossible movie to enjoy it.

Lastly, you can also select between a traditional EV experience and a simulated “engine,” where you get a tach that climbs as you push the tall pedal, and then “shift” with the paddles. The way the car bucks as you “shift” and stutters if you hit the “rev limiter” is spectacularly realistic. As a fan of science and technology, I’m deeply impressed with Hyundai’s achievement in creating what is essentially a drivable video game. That said, as a driving enthusiast and open-road appreciator, the 5 N kind of leaves me feeling like the kid in this meme:

Computer chess kid meme.
TheOdd1sOut/YouTube

I know—one could argue that every modern performance car has a degree of this experience. With today’s traction management tech and almost-everything-by-wire, how connected to the road are you, really, in anything built after about 2015? In principle, the idea of a manual mode that can only affect performance adversely, and forces the computer to behave exclusively for my amusement, feels kind of cringey, just like the sound piped in to give the motor an aural character. I’m glad Hyundai allows you to silence it with the push of a button.

Value and Verdict

As long as you can work with a 200-ish mile range EV, this is an easy one to endorse. The Hyundai Ioniq 5 N is absolutely a compelling option if your car budget is in the $70,000 neighborhood. It’s got a great combo of novelty, style, and serious speed. Personally, I would rather get a softer, cheaper EV for getting around and keep my 22-year-old manual Bimmer for fun. I can push that E46 and probably not even break the speed limit.

Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, powerful front three-quarter stance.
Andrew P. Collins

The weight of the wheel in your hand, the sigh of the straight six when you make a higher-rev shift, the momentum transfer through corners. It’s cliché to say, but new hardware just doesn’t hit the same, even if it does a perfect job simulating a transmission.

The other side of that is something I touched on above—the speeds you can hit in this car without even thinking about it. I get that it’s cool, and I certainly admire the capability from a technological standpoint. But at the risk of sounding crotchety, do we need mass-market vehicles that snap to 60 mph in under three seconds? The Ioniq 5 N didn’t convert me to categorical EV superiority, but it impressed the hell out of me. There’s no question this is a good car; it’s just not the ultimate performance experience.

Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, front three-quarter stance.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, rear three-quarter in the woods.
Hyundai Ioniq 5 N, head-on.
Andrew P. Collins

Want to talk about what the most enjoyable 0 to 60 time is? Email the author at andrew.collins@thedrive.com

The post 2025 Hyundai Ioniq 5 N Review: A Racing Sim You Can Drive on the Road appeared first on The Drive.