Our Hyundai Ioniq 6’s EPA-Estimated 361-Mile Range Remains Out of Reach
But as is usually the case when real life intersects with daily EV operation, the small numbers also come with big caveats.
I’m blissfully rolling along Interstate 5 in California’s Central Valley in our 2024 Hyundai Ioniq 6 yearlong test vehicle when the infotainment screen flashes: Range at 10 percent, charge immediately, vehicle performance impacted. Sounds pretty ominous.
Where I’m at along the interstate, gas stations—let alone EV chargers—are in short supply. I’m not worried, though, as I’d long ago IDed the high-speed Electrify America station I’m planning to charge at, and it’s only 20 miles or so away. But suddenly, a touch of the ol’ range anxiety wells up. What if I misjudged the distance? Or somehow something else keeps me from filling up with electrons as the Hyundai EV sedan has demanded and I’m left stranded? It’s a fleeting thought, though, and I easily reach my charging station destination located at the back of a largely deserted America's Best Value Inn with 8 percent charge remaining.
Decisions, Decisions
The decision to push past the Ioniq 6’s 10 percent barrier was one of many microchoices I’d made since I picked up the car in Seattle and started a journey that would take me primarily down the I-5 back toward our L.A. home base, where it will spend the last of its days with us basking in the sun after dancing in the rain of the Pacific Northwest. Deciding on which chargers to charge at and when, how far to push the car’s mileage limits, if I’d charge to 80 or 100 percent, how I’d use any apps. You know, stuff that gas car people largely never have to think about on a 1,200-plus-mile drive.
The key question we wanted to explore during my road trip? How far could I go before having to recharge. The short answer? Not very, at least not in relation to the 2024 Hyundai Ioniq 6 SE RWD Long Range test vehicle’s impressive on-paper 361-mile EPA combined range number. And it didn’t approach what our test team recorded for a mechanically similar 2023 model, where we were able to eke out 291 miles at a constant 70 mph using 95 percent of a full charge in our MotorTrend Road Trip Range test. Bottom line, when it comes to an EV’s range, the day-to-day reality is always more complicated, as I found out during my first real all-electric-powered road trip.
Wet and Cold Road Home
Anyone who knows the I-5 route from Seattle to L.A. in March knows it can be wet and cold during that time of year, with lots of elevation changes, especially in and around Northern California’s Mt. Shasta area. It was all those things. After picking up the car in Seattle, I made the easy 160-mile or so jaunt to the greater Portland area to visit some family, where it dipped into the 30s and was wet and nasty at night while I was there. Those are the kinds of elemental conditions that will shave range with the car just sitting in the driveway (indeed, it lost about 20 miles of indicated range each morning) and are among the downsides of EVs in their present state of development.
When you’re living with an EV as a daily driver, and you have a Level 2 charger at your home and you know where the fast chargers are in your vicinity, range isn’t something you normally think about. But it was pretty much always on my mind as I left Portland and headed south toward Sonoma Raceway, where I had a date set up with BFGoodrich and Skip Barber Racing School.
