EVERYTHING, EVERYWHERE, ALL AT ONCE IN THE HYUNDAI IONIQ 5 N

Seriously, why would one want to mess with the perfection of instantaneous torque, an ultra-quiet ride, and the most linear power band in the industry that an EV can provide?  

But then the straight-laced automotive staff at Consumer Reports were asked what car of all the ones tested was their favorite of 2024. To our surprise, many staffers singled out the Hyundai Ioniq 5 N EV and its ability to make you think you’re driving a high-performance, gas-engine sports car (Best and Worst Cars of 2024). 

And then there are the YouTubers like ThatDudeinBlue that had too much fun fooling his friends into thinking they were riding in an awesome high-performance gas-engine hybrid when in fact it was the Ioniq 5 N pure electric vehicle (Scaring My Friends in a 600HP Hyundai is Hilarious).

So now having driven the IONIQ 5 N, we’re tossing all of our pre-conceived notions about electric vehicles emulating the driving characteristics of gas-powered cars out the proverbial window. 

What Do We Have Here?

The 2025 Hyundai IONIQ 5 N is a high-performance electric crossover SUV with a starting manufacturer’s suggested retail price of $66,200. It's powered by two electric motors, offering up to 601 horsepower (641 horsepower with N Grin Boost engaged) and 545 pound-feet of torque (568 pound-feet with N Grin Boost). The car has an 84 kWh battery pack and a range of up to 221 miles according to Hyundai USA. 

Who’s In with the Hyundai’s N Crowd?

Have you wondered what the N stands for, as in the Hyundai IONIQ 5 N? Evidently, the N letter represents Namyang, the city in South Korea where the N brand was born; it’s also where the global research and development center is located. Hyundai vehicles with an "N" designation indicate the car is designed and engineered to deliver an exhilarating and track-capable driving experience.

N is also a hat tip to Nürburgring, Germany, where Hyundai N models undergo testing and refinement to ensure their performance and durability. And Hyundai says the N logo itself is inspired by the shape of a chicane—a challenging turn on a racetrack. 

But of all the N models, the Hyundai IONIQ 5 N is the flagship. It’s also the most powerful N model (more on this to come).

A Pokémon Monster in Sheep’s Clothing

Viewed from afar, the Hyundai IONIQ 5 N looks like your everyday compact hatchback. Get closer and you realize it’s quite a bit bigger than a typical hatchback. 

It’s very modern-looking, almost boxy four-door, but a closer look reveals all sorts of high performance upgrades like a set of huge (nine and a half inches wide) 275/35 ZR21 103Y Pirelli P-Zero tires that are about the only sane way keep this car (relatively) stuck to the road.

This is perhaps the biggest little car ever, the interior space and accommodations are almost full-size sedan-like (that is, if sedans had seats that resembled the racing bucket variety all around). This guy seems very solidly-built and it feels like one piece of precision machinery when you toss it around. It never seems flustered or out of breath.

There’s nothing very exciting, zoomy, or blatant-looking under the hood. The product package designer did try to make it look like many of the new cars we’ve driven in the past few years though.  There one big lump in the middle with the Hyundai “N” logo which, we assumed was one of the two high performance motors this mad machine has stashed away.

Driving the Hyundai IONIQ 5 N

There is so much that has never before been available* in the IONIQ 5 N that you need to have an operating manual to know what you have. Thankfully, Hyundai provides an outstanding one for this vehicle. 

Take page 6-55 of the owner’s manual, for instance (that’s 453 pages into the vital information about this car that almost seems to have come from another dimension).  It’s the equivalent of discovering the secret behind Omega 13 in Galaxy Quest. It also confirms what your gut and butt (and any unwary passenger who may have been along for the ride and has resumed normal breathing) will tell you after you’ve experienced it: 

You may increase the output 40 hp for 10 seconds (601hp > 641 hp) and maximize the motor response rate. You may reuse after waiting for 10 seconds following 10 seconds of use.

...HELLO!  

ARE YOU KIDDING? 641 horsepower? that’s only 30 shy of the vaunted Chevrolet Z06 Corvette! Keep in mind that the normal, everyday, every night, every trip anywhere horsepower rating for this squared-off, squared-away little four-door is SIX HUNDRED AND ONE.

All that brute strength aside (and that’s not an easy thing to do), this little car with its very distinctive, chiseled Sci Fi Space Tug looks is just as much fun to drive in a lawful and respectable manner. Of course, unless that smug-looking actor or stock broker or horse thief driver in the next lane over decides to do a Max Verstappen on you, pulling the pin on this one will leave that guy (or gal) holding a conference with themselves (about what we can guess will begin with the words “WHAT THE ...”).

Select the Multiverse of Your Choice

And then there’s the simulated engine sounds that tries to make some sense out of the sort of looney-bin acceleration that this machine provides when beckoned.  It growls, screams, burbles, burps, coughs, pops, roars, and screams in a perfect imitation of pistons, rods, crankshafts, cams, valves, and all that bygone internal engine 

Stepping back into the real world after driving this one required a couple of moments of quiet contemplation before keying the ignition to recollect that we no longer had the magic of acceleration that felt more like short distance time travel.  “OK breathe, breathe, easy, you are back to being concerned about how fast that the car a thousand yards down the street is coming when you pull out of your driveway … easy, breathe.”

It’s just so much fun to explore the variations available. For instance, engaging the Supersonic mode, the N-shifter mode, and adjusting the volume upwards makes the Ionic 5 N sound like an F1 racer. 

Tastes Great, Less Filling

Perhaps most importantly, the 5 N provides this fun without hurting the car. Drive a normal car around a winding road in sustained redline mode will surely shorten the life of the car. In the 5 N, it’s all a simulation, as are the other noises it makes, like the rev limiter sound when you exceed the redline and the engine bogging when you’ve got the pedal to the metal in too high a (simulated) gear.  It’s great fun, none of it is real, and none of it hurts the two electric motors one bit in the 5 N.  

Quantities Limited

Since LA Car is actually located in Los Angeles, here’s yet another statement box and a bit of a caveat.  It reads:

2025 IONIQ 5 N is available in limited quantities and at select dealers in select states only. Contact your Hyundai dealer for availability details.⁠

We’ll stipulate here these motorized versions of that Stitch movie animal are surely worth crossing state lines for.  Besides, driving one of these 5 Ns home and blowing off any posers on the open road will be well worth the journey. 

Here’s the deal. Very soon, EVERYONE with any car sense is going to know about this little Q-ship** and a whole bunch of them are going to have forgone buying a BMW “M” series road rocket or one of those wise-ass Dodge Demons in favor of this Korean Pokémon-Transformer (Corvettes are probably safe for now).    

Cars That Bring Joy

We often get asked, “Of all the cars you’ve driven, what are your favorites?” When it comes to the joy of driving the car, people are surprised to learn that among our favorites are not the most expensive nor the most powerful cars around. Two that come to mind are the Miata and the Mini Cooper. Neither have loads of horsepower or cost an arm and a leg. Both, however, have a high fun-to-drive quotient and make you look forward to taking even the most mundane drive to the corner market.  

Alas, with the exposure to the Hyundai IONIQ 5 N, we’re going to have to add it to the list. And that puts a big, fat asterisk to the joy equation, as the 5 N is plenty expensive and exceedingly powerful. 

This cute, well-proportioned, little hatchback with all the tech marvels and race-crazy power settings also comes with a window sticker that totes up all the fun and games listed here and rings the buzzer at a number that’s as breathtaking as this one’s incredible performance.  To wit: $68,155.00 (and that includes $1,375 for inland freight and handling, $475.00 for “ATLAS WHITE (SAW) Paint” and $210.00 for “Carpeted Floor Mats”). That’s a whole bunch of bucks but this one really gives a lot of tingle for the money.

And here’s a quick note for all the tariff-watchers out there: The parts content box for this one goes like this: U.S./Canadian Parts Content: 1%; Major Sources of Foreign Parts Content: Korea 65%, China 30% (Editor’s Note: That’s only 96% of a car. Anyone know where the other 4% is coming from?). 

Trickle Down Theory

But what makes the IONIQ 5 N such a joy appears to be largely a product of software (the simulated power and torque bands, the upshifting, the downshifting) and a convincing surround sound system (to emulate the high-performance gas-engine acceleration roar and deceleration burble sounds).  

 So, with software and a good sound system, one would think Hyundai can trickle down most of the joy of the IONIQ 5 N into a less expensive EV? This bodes well for the possibility that much of this goodness can be fitted in a cheaper Hyundai. The 5 N represents the current state of the art in how much fun an EV can be to drive. The future looks very promising for this joy to be made available to more consumers. 

*25 years ago (April 1, 2010), LA Car’s Editor reviewed a radio accessory that was (if you really stretch your imagination) the forerunner of the N Sound+ mode in the Hyundai IONIQ 5N. Called the SoundRacer V8, it plugged into the cigarette lighter in your car (assuming you have one), tuned your radio to a specified station, and the device detects the engine’s RPM (revolutions per minute) and generates a signal that replicates the sound of a high performance V8 at the same RPM. The signal is transmitted through your FM radio and comes out of your car’s speakers. It worked best on cars with a manual transmission. For the cost of two dinners at a café, the SoundRacer provided some amusing entertainment (see LA Car's Eat Like A Bird, Roar Like A Lion).

*WW1-2 term for a ship that looked like a harmless merchant ship but was in fact, really a very heavily-armed gunship that took out a lot of unsuspecting opposition warships and subs who has allowed a Q-ship to get too close.  The first such conversions of merchant ships into phantom killers was carried out in boatyards at Queensland, Ireland thus the “Q” designation stuck and went on to be used for any sort of military subterfuge on sea or land.