Kia wants to take on Range Rover. Don't laugh, the company's deadly serious. The briefing literature handed out at the brand-hosted media drive in California is positively littered with comparisons to the luxury SUV brand. On cargo room, "more than the 2023 Range Rover"; second-row legroom, "more than the 2024 Range Rover"; quietness, "equal to the 2023 Range Rover P400 SE"; braking, "shorter than the Range Rover P400"; acceleration, "beating both the Mercedes EQS 450 and Range Rover P400" … and on it goes.

In case anyone was left in any doubt, Kia states in writing that the EV9 is intended to outperform other luxury three-row SUVs (gas or electric) priced above $100,000, "including the 2023 Range Rover P400 SE 3-row." So, there you have it—it's war with Land Rover.

Kia had a hit with the EV6, both in its regular guise and in the GT version, despite its polarizing design with a rear end that some loved yet some reviled. It deserved to do well, though—not only did it feature what is still the best charging tech on the market, but it also drove well, despite a few minor niggles. Now the brand is opening 2024 with its biggest launch yet, in every sense. The all-electric EV9 is a frankly massive, seven-seater SUV aimed at bringing in newer, wealthier punters to the Kia brand, the kind that would normally buy Land Rovers, no less.

Kia is likely very pleased with itself that it has managed to beat sister brand Hyundai in the race to bring a car like this to market. Hyundai's Ioniq 7, built on exactly the same underpinnings, isn't landing until later this year, and the group is deliberately not releasing too much info, no doubt in an attempt to give both cars space to shine. This of course means that Kia has got some time to steal a march on its sibling.

First, the basics. The EV9 is a full 5 meters long with room inside for three rows of seats. The look is unashamedly SUV, with bold, angular lines and jumbo wheel arches. Kia very much wants to signal that this thing can off-road. You get two choices of battery, one a thumping great 99.8-kWh pack, the other 76.1 kWh. You also get a choice of two motor setups: a single motor rear-drive with 200 bhp and 350 Nm of torque, or a dual-motor, four-wheel-drive with 380 bhp and 700 Nm.

The entry level EV9 starts at $54,900 (£65,025 in the UK, but Brits only get the bigger battery) and comes with 19-inch alloys, LED headlights, body-colored flush door handles, power front seats, a triple-screen dashboard (comprising twin 12.3-inch displays plus a 5.3-inch climate-control panel in between), six USB-C sockets (two per row), and an eight-speaker audio system. This price point is, putting it politely, punchy for Kia, and only a few years ago would have seemed laughable for the brand. Not anymore. Plus, it's way cheaper than the competition it's hoping to lure you away from.

The even pricier ($73,900) GT-Line S launch trim boasts a head-up display, a 14-speaker Meridian audio system, and front- and second-row sunroofs. It's also the version available with the six-seat layout, where the middle row has two “captain’s chairs” that can rotate 180 degrees to face the rear. The trunk is, of course, big, with 333 liters of space, as well as a further 52 in the frunk (we're all going to have to start getting used to the word, I'm afraid).

As for how that prodigious battery performs, Kia is claiming an EPA-estimated range of 304 miles between charges on the Long Range model (this drops to 230 miles on the Light RWD, though) and, thanks to the group's winning 800V charging architecture, top-ups from 10 to 80 percent in 24 minutes are possible if you come across the right infrastructure (good luck). The power output on the AWD version is sufficient to propel this 2.6-ton electric SUV from 0 to 62 mph in just 4.5 seconds, and on to a max of 124 mph, if you go for the GT-Line.

Inside the EV9 is a very pleasant place to be. I'd say it is, as promised, as quiet as a Range Rover, or thereabouts. Thanks in part to low-noise tires and acoustic glass, you don't hear much road noise at all until you approach about 80 mph, but frankly you can get to that speed all too quickly in the GT-Line model.

The triple-screen dash is a particular success over previous Kia cars. The new UI is clearer and less cluttered, so looking down for your speed and driving info no longer feels like staring at a computer game. Crucially, though, it takes enough cues from the old design to still be familiar. Nothing is lost but much is gained. The climate-control panel in the middle is a smart move, too. The only real criticisms here are that, as usual, Kia, like all other car brands, has still not mastered the art of nesting options in obvious menus and making the most used stuff only a tap or two away; the infotainment screen itself could also be a tad more responsive. You want a display to be sure of the icon you're pressing, yes, but it destroys the magic a little if you have to stab at it harder than you'd like. Another fail is a surprisingly ugly steering wheel.

My personal bugbear with both Kias and Hyundais—the lack of wireless CarPlay and androids Auto—has finally been fixed. The EV9 is the first car in the group to let you use either operating system completely untethered. Lord knows why it took the group so long to address this. I interviewed Hyundai Motor Group president Song Chang-Hyeon, a former Apple and Microsoft engineer who heads the group's software development division, at CES at the start of January, and he seemingly shared my confusion and told me it was one of the very first things he wanted to set straight after he was appointed to the board in 2021. So he did just that.

The EV9's party trick, however, is not in the front, but in the back. Kia wanted to make this EV a full seven-seater, and it is. Thanks to the sheer size of the car, I had no trouble shifting my 5'10" frame into the last row. This is not a spot to where you must relegate smaller kids—it's just fine for adults. The middle row can slide forward and back to help free up extra legroom, and there's good shoulder room as well, so no feeling like you're sitting on top of other passengers. All the seats are superbly comfortable, and headroom is excellent—yes, even in back row.

From a power point of view, this being a Kia, it has vehicle-to-load capability, which means you can plug in household appliances and run them from the car battery. But the EV9 also has vehicle-to-home and vehicle-to-grid, too. Kia's new flagship can apparently run a house for two days should power go down. For less dramatic power needs, each row gets two USB-C sockets of an output that can charge a laptop (I know, because I tried). The on-board Wi-Fi works well too (as long as the built-in SIM has signal), but it gets disabled if you switch on that wireless CarPlay or androids Auto, frustratingly. In short, it's perfectly possible to work from the rear of the EV9 on long-distance trips.

There's no doubt the EV9 will surprise you with how quick it can be. This is both a good and bad thing. It's wonderful to be able to get such a beast of an SUV out of a spot of bother in a trice, but stopping something of this size at speed can be hairy. Its speed (and range) is helped by a surprisingly low drag coefficient of just 0.28—which means this boxy behemoth of an EV is more aerodynamic than an i-Pace and, astonishingly, a Lamborghini Huracán GT3.

Yet, despite that attention-grabbing acceleration figure, this is not a car in which you should go bonkers. Don't start hurling it around corners on mountain roads. Physics can't be cheated, and the bulk of the EV reveals itself if pushed. That said, the ride quality is excellent. Obviously geared for comfort, road bumps are effortlessly smoothed out, which is impressive considering no air suspension or active dampers are employed.

The steering is accurate enough, too, and it all comes together to make an electric SUV ideal for carrying people in style over long distances or in urban areas, which is precisely what it is designed to do. It drives as if it is smaller than it is, thankfully, and the good interior visibility adds to this illusion. Try parking it, however, or attempt a U-turn in town, and you're quickly reminded of the size of the EV9. Sadly, on this brand-hosted media drive we weren't given the chance to see how the EV9 performed off-road.

As for real-world battery use, over 169 miles during a mix of backroad and freeway driving in normal driving mode with periods that were “enthusiastic,” I managed an average of 2.9 miles/kWh, during which time the battery dropped from 95 to 35 percent. This is pleasingly close to the EV9's advertised 3.1 miles/kWh, and should mean the SUV can give more than 300 miles on a full charge in everyday use.

There are certainly problems with the EV. Why is there no option for rear entertainment in this full seven-seater? The doors rattle a little at high volume with that Meridian system, too. The interior materials used are good, but not as premium as they should be if you're taking on the luxury end of the SUV market. Then there's the drive selector stick, which is a disgrace.

But it's easy to overlook these failures because there's so much to recommend about the EV9: the boxy but attractive looks, the cavernous interior space, the proper adult-friendly third row of seats, the successful new UI and wireless CarPlay and androids Auto, the 800V charging system than can now do vehicle-to-home (which supposedly could save you $1,000 to $1,500 a year if used correctly), a supremely comfortable drive, and the fact that it will be one of the very few EVs to qualify for the full $7,500 tax credit in the US.

The biggest win here, though, is obvious: value for money. Yes, this is the most expensive Kia yet, but if you stack it up against Range Rover it really is a viable option, and it starts at half the price of the UK rival. Half.

Indeed, Kia claims that many of the people who have paid deposits for the EV9 are trading in premium cars like Land Rovers, and I can't say I'm surprised. The fact that the EV9 gives you so much for your money, yet still manages to be refined and classy, means that this is, unquestionably, Kia's best car yet. Is it enough to poach affluent customers from Range Rover, BMW, Rivian, and Mercedes? Oh yes.