Kia Adds Style To Economy

It’s a tiny subcompact that gets 30 mpg in the city and 40 on the highway, and it costs about $18,000 with all the options.

The Rio gets decent power from its 1.6-liter engine, though an automatic transmission takes a toll on performance. (Photo: Kia)

But don’t call it an econobox.

The all-new 2012 Kia Rio 5-Door EX lifts the formerly rental car status of the Rio to a whole different level, offering slick European looks and a peppy engine that makes saving on gas a lot of fun.

Updating the Rio for the first time since 2006, Kia has taken its new "design-led transformation" concept to heart, crafting a stylish hatchback that can standup to hip recent competition from the Chevrolet Sonic or Ford Fiesta.

With angry headlights and a sneering, stylized front grill, the Rio cuts an aggressive figure from the front, while playing things a bit more straightforward with the simple European hatchback look in back.

The five-door hatchback configuration adds versatility to the subcompact Rio. (Photo: Kia)

That aggressive style isn’t all posturing. The new Rio comes with a direct-injection 1.6-liter inline-4 engine that cranks out 138 horsepower and 123 pound-feet of torque. That might not sound too impressive, but when you’re dealing with a 2,500-pound hatchback, that little engine packs a punch.

My EX tester came equipped with the new six-speed automatic transmission, which also helped milk all the fun out of that tiny engine. It’s certainly not the fastest car around, but its smooth acceleration, smart shifting and nimble handling offered an enjoyable drive.

The improvements to the Rio extend to the interior, which features a surprisingly roomy cabin and decent storage space. The backseat is still tight, but the kids or your shorter friends should be OK.

The soft-touch dashboard offers a solid and stylish look, accented by climate controls that echo the toggle switches in the Mini Cooper.

The touch-screen radio and control panel features the Uvo voice-activation system, developed by Microsoft, which lets users give voice commands to the system, much like the Ford Sync system. It doesn’t work as well as the iPhone’s Siri, but once you get a handle on the commands, it’s pretty efficient. But really, the touch-screen controls are straightforward and easy to use, so shouting commands at the radio didn’t really seem that necessary.

The upgraded Rio EX model gets some premium interiot trim and features. (Photo: Kia)

A big strike against the system: if the car comes with the navigation system, the Uvo isn’t available, which takes away the most useful application for voice command.

Rios equipped with either the navigation or Uvo systems come with a rear backup camera, a rare commodity at this price range and a near necessity, since the pillars in back block most of the rear visibility.

The EX test car came with the Convenience Package, which includes alloy wheels, front fog lights, power folding mirrors, the Uvo system, leather-wrapped steering wheel, soft touch dashboard and more. Those added up to $1,000, a small price tag for so many nice touches.

With its 2012 Rio, the once painfully economical South Korean carmaker has taken its game up a notch, with a hip subcompact that is way more fun to drive than a Kia has any right to be.

If this trend continues, in a couple of years that sentence won’t even make sense.