Hyundai i20N - long-term review

Modes. They’ve become a bit of a Hyundai N division ‘thing’. Back in 2018, I ran N’s first car – the i30N hot hatchback – and it’ll not surprise you to learn it took me a few months to figure out my favourite of its 1,944 possible ‘Custom’ configurations of suspension, differential, engine and exhaust settings.

Back then, you could pick’n’mix between them all and put your ideal setup into one steering wheel button press. Much like you can in the i20N, only now there’s a second Custom button, which ought to provide double trouble. It’s proved easier to choose what I want this time around, though.

The main reason for that is the i20N's lack of adaptive damping. With no gradually stiffening suspension setups to toggle between, pulling my best ‘concentrating road tester’ face as I try and discern their varying levels of nuggetyness*, the whole process is much simpler.

So I’ve gone for the lightest possible steering (does anybody like carmakers' insistence on fake weight?), the sharpest engine response but least rorty exhaust note (I’m vaguely mature now), and the middle setting of both ESC intervention and rev-matching. I’ve made the i20N’s second button replicate those settings but with the latter two turned completely off for when I want to be a serious-shoes driver. Or mislead innocent passengers into thinking I’m a serious-shoes driver.

But you know what? I’m barely touching either N button anyway. The car starts up in ‘Normal’ mode, which gives the digital instrument binnacle a very plain but legible pair of dials rather than a stocky central rev counter while leaving every dynamic parameter in its base mode. Because there’s no altering the suspension and I like the steering and exhaust note at their least ‘sporty’ – those being any car’s most identifiable points of customisation at regular road speeds – Normal suits all but my most mischievous of moods.

Which I reckon says more about the inherent quality of the i20N than it does my Lemon & Herb tastes. If the car is sharp and tactile enough without a single sport button being pressed, Hyundai’s clearly nailed its behaviour from the outset; whatever your driving mode preference there’s sharp pedal responses, a snickety gearchange and a nose that changes direction as keenly as a Labradoodle’s in a greasy spoon. A bunch of talents that are also proving a bit of a Hyundai N division ‘thing’...

Mileage: 2679 Our mpg: 39.9

*It’s not a word, no matter what car journalists might try and tell you