The Kia EV6 is one of several electric vehicles built on the E-GMP platform that will be powering plenty of EVs from Kia, Hyundai, and Genesis in the future — and from one of my very limited spins behind the wheel, the EV6 is going to be a good one. Slightly less good are the machine’s paint color choices, which could use a little bit of extra pep. Here’s how we rank those paint colors.
Available Trims: Light (RWD), Wind (RWD), Wind, (e-AWD)
There is nothing otherworldly about this gray. It’s gray. Stop trying to make gray sound cool. You can’t, because it’s fucking gray.
Available Trims: Wind (RWD), Wind, (e-AWD)
Again: Stop trying to make gray sound cool. Kia earns minor brownie points for Steel Gray because its name more adequately describes the shade of this particular EV6, even though it is not exactly an inspired color.
Available Trims: Wind (RWD), Wind, (e-AWD), GT-Line (RWD), GT-Line (e-AWD)
It helps me sleep at night to imagine all drivers of black cars are imagining themselves driving a Batmobile.
Available Trims: Wind (RWD), Wind, (e-AWD)
Glacier is the first of two white shades for the EV6, and while I wanted to like Glacier better than its counterpart, I simply do not. Its gray undertone makes it look preemptively dirty, which I guess is fine for people who never want to wash their cars.
Available Trims: All
Another white but a little less creamy, Snow White Pearl is a nice, bright shade for those of you who really like your whites white. It’s fine.
Available Trims: GT-Line (RWD), GT-Line (e-AWD)
Steel Matte Gray earns a pass on my normal “gray is boring” dictum because matte paint is inherently cool. It emits a casual coolness that’s kind of a little intimidating, and it also kind of makes my stomach hurt because I hate the sound of nails against unburnished metal. But as a paint scheme on a car? Impeccable.
Available Trims: Light (AWD), Wind (RWD), Wind, (e-AWD)
Of the two blue shades offered by Kia, I argue that Gravity Blue is the lesser blue. It’s like the EV6 designers looked at the color palette for the car and said, “We could use one more color, but we should probably stay away from yet another gray or black” and came up with this instead. There is at least a hue to it, but it’s not the EV6's most exciting color.
Available Trims: Wind (RWD), Wind, (e-AWD), GT-Line (RWD), GT-Line (e-AWD)
As a longtime owner of several red cars, I am a noted red car enthusiast. You can give me the largest heap of shit on wheels, but if you paint it red, I will immediately decide that it has redeemable qualities. The Kia EV6's Runway Red shares a name with my favorite color of long-since-discontinued nail polish and is the same shade as my favorite long-since-discontinued matte lipstick. It’s a good color.
Available Trims: Wind (RWD), Wind, (e-AWD), GT-Line (RWD), GT-Line (e-AWD)
If I was a blue, Yacht Blue is the kind of blue I would want to be. It’s a very cool shade, but somehow it has a voluptuousness to it that makes it feel very comforting. Yacht Blue looks like how I imagine the ocean feels to people who like the ocean: vast, wide, and comforting. For me, the ocean is a terrifying place filled with terrifying creatures. So I think I’ll stick with my Yacht Blue.