Hyundai i40 Tourer (2011 – 2019) Review

The Hyundai i40 Tourer prioritises ease of use and comfort above driving fun. This means it’s not as engaging as a Ford Mondeo Estate, but the South Korean car delivers when it comes to carting families long distances with minimal fuss and expense. The boot isn’t as well shaped as some, like the Skoda Octavia and Skoda Superb Estate models, but it gives the Honda Accord Tourer and most other rivals a tough time. Read on for our full Hyundai i40 Tourer review.

The Hyundai i40 Tourer is Hyundai doing what it does best. It’s a good-quality, good-value car that appeals to the left side of the brain rather than the right.

In other words, if you made a big checklist of all the things that are impressive about the Hyundai i40 Tourer, you’d come up with a desirable used car, yet you’d never actually consider desirability to be one of its traits.

Initially, the Hyundai i40 Tourer estate was only available with one engine, a 1.7-litre diesel in three versions – 115PS, 136PS and 141PS.

This was replaced by a 1.6 CRDi diesel late in 2018, while a 1.6-litre GDi petrol was also introduced.

One thing all these engines have in common is strong fuel economy – with the newer diesels capable of a combined 54.3mpg under WLTP tests.

The car was launched with trim levels called Active, Style and Premium, but a 2015 update changed that to S, SE Nav, SE Business and Premium.

All cars get alloy wheels, Bluetooth and air-conditioning, plus you only need jump one grade to SE Nav for a full colour touchscreen multimedia set-up and climate control. This is a well-equipped car.

Cabin quality is excellent throughout, with good use of soft-touch plastics for the upper dash and door trim, plus glossy black trim even on base models.

Some of the dials and buttons are flimsy, and you might think the dashboard design falls into the ‘trying too hard’ category with its swoopy creases.

But overall the Hyundai i40 Tourer has a quality feel.

So, it’s well-equipped, spacious, comfortable and the numbers stack up.

What the Hyundai i40 Tourer lacks, though, is a sense of fun or feelgood factor. Whether that’s important will depend on what you want from your car.

Fancy a second opinion? Read heycar’s Hyundai i40 Tourer review.

The Hyundai i40 Tourer is set up primarily for comfort, so the suspension is on the soft side, the steering is very light and the car effectively shuts out road, wind and engine noise at higher speeds.

That all means it’s far better on the motorway than it is around town or anywhere else. This is not an involving car to drive.

The light steering gives the car a feeling of low-speed agility that belies its size – at 4.8 metres, it’s a long estate. Sadly, it also provides almost no feedback, making for especially numb cornering.

But do you care about that? Because in every other way, this is a pleasant estate car.

There’s surprisingly little chugging from the diesel engine and the excellent, quite low-slung driving position and supportive seats make it pretty relaxing transport.  

It’s worth noting that there’s a big difference in feel between the torque convertor automatic gearbox available with the older 136PS engine and the dual-clutch automatic (DCT) with the later 141PS unit.

The former is a real weakness, sapping the life out of the engine and coming with a significant fuel economy penalty, sinking it to a 47.1mpg average from 62.8mpg with a manual.

The more modern DCT is a far better driving experience – quicker to change gear and with better low-range engine response. But surprisingly, it too reduces economy, albeit not as drastically, dropping it to 56.5mpg. 

One thing you’re guaranteed with any Hyundai i40 Tourer is a lack of pace, with no variant of the sole 1.7-litre diesel achieving a 0-62mph time under ten seconds.

As with much about the car though, numbers only tell half the story, because even the 115PS unit has a healthy 260Nm torque at just 1250rpm, while the 141PS unit has 340Nm at 1700rpm.

To a greater or lesser extent in both cases, there’s a surge of acceleration from the off, but it rapidly tails away.

It means a lot of gear changing around town with a manual, but that’s no real hardship because the Hyundai i40 Tourer has a light, pleasant gear shift action.

Every Hyundai i40 Tourer comes with seven airbags as standard, which includes one for the driver’s knees.

The car also has ABS anti-lock brakes, ESP traction and stability control, and hill start assist. An Assist Pack offered lane departure warning and assistance.

When the car was facelifted in 2015, the lane departure function became standard on the top-spec Premium trim. It also gained rear side airbags. All models at this point now came with a tyre pressure monitoring system.

The Hyundai i40 performed very well in Euro NCAP crash tests, recording a full five-star rating.

With an unbraked trailer, the Hyundai i40 Tourer is good to tow up to 700kg, while with a braked trailer it can be hitched up with as much as 1500kg.

This makes the car capable of dealing with most caravans.

In volume terms, the Hyundai i40 Tourer has a quantifiably large boot capacity at 553 litres, stretching out to 1719 litres with the rear seats folded down (which have a 60/40 split as standard).

That compares favourably to the 500-1605 litres of cargo space of the Ford Mondeo Estate of the same era.

Unfortunately, the Hyundai i40 Tourer’s boot is awkwardly shaped, because of the way the rear suspension encroaches into it at either side.

This is a hindrance to the loading of large objects – as is the fact that the rear seats don’t fold entirely flat.

The floor is flush with the boot lip, at least, and there’s some under-floor storage.

With the rear seats up, the Hyundai i40 Tourer offers plenty of rear knee space, although the swoopy styling means that headroom is limited for taller adults.

Rear seat passengers will find storage limited to a couple of nets on the front seat backs, and shallow door pockets.

Up front, it’s much better, with a large central storage bin, a big glove compartment and deeper storage spaces in the doors.

The covered receptacle in the dashboard is surprisingly large, too, and a good way of neatly storing fuel receipts and other small items.

The Hyundai i40 Tourer’s dash looks a little haphazard, owing to a large amount of buttons – some of which are in unusual places. But because they’re all clearly labelled, it’s easy to work your way around them.

There are some plastics in the Hyundai's cabin that don't feel quite as chunky and solid as those you experience in a Volkswagen Passat or Skoda Superb.

However, experience tells us that the Hyundai i40 Tourer is more than up to the rigours of everyday use, and won’t suffer from the creaks and squeaks that are common in some competitors.

The touchscreen media system of Hyundai i40 Tourer SE Nav versions and above is one of the easier ones to use too, because there are physical buttons for all the main functions.

This means that you’re not endlessly navigating back and forth through sub-menus.

A 10-year-old Hyundai i40 Tourer in SE Nav spec with 65,000 miles and the 1.7-litre turbodiesel engine can be yours from around £6000.

If you’d rather have a newer car, a 2018 example with as little as 20,000 miles showing on the dials could be parked outside your house for £16,000.

This will get a model with the newer 1.6 turbodiesel engine in SE Nav trim.

Hyundai claimed the 1.7-litre turbodiesel was good for up to 65.7mpg, although this was assessed under the previous and more optimistic NEDC testing regime.

Our Real MPG data shows you can reckon on achieving 48mpg with this engine.

Choose the 1.6-litre petrol and, unusually, it seems to return almost exactly what Hyundai stated when it was new – around 42mpg.

The most widely available Hyundai i40 Tourer model comes with the 1.7-litre turbodiesel engine. This emits 119g/km in 136PS form.

That means you pay £35 per year in road tax, which seems like a good deal to us. Most other Hyundai i40 Tourers fall into the same bracket.

Service prices at Hyundai dealers are very reasonable, and using an independent garage will save you a bit more again on labour rates. Parts prices for most consumables are affordable, too.

When it comes to insurance, the Hyundai i40 Tourer ranges from group 12 to 18, so it’s one of the more cost-effective cars to get cover for in this area of the market.

The entry-level Hyundai i40 Tourer Active came with 16-inch alloy wheels, Bluetooth with voice recognition, a leather steering wheel with audio controls, electric heated door mirrors with integrated LED indicators, electric front and rear windows, and an electric parking brake with automatic hold function.

The mid-spec Hyundai i40 Tourer Style has touchscreen satellite navigation with a rear view camera, front and rear parking sensors, cruise control and dual-zone climate control.

The Hyundai i40 Tourer Premium model adds further leather upholstery, a panoramic sunroof, keyless entry and an instrument cluster with LCD colour display as standard.

There was also the option of Lane Departure Warning and Smart Parking Assist, a heated leather steering wheel and ventilated front seats with the Assist Pack.

In 2015, the range was revised and updated. Trim levels started with the Hyundai i40 Tourer S, which has 16-inch alloy wheels, air-con, Bluetooth, heated door mirrors, all-round electric windows, remote central locking, a USB socket and tinted glass.

The Hyundai i40 Tourer SE Nav has climate control, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto connectivity, plus a touchscreen featuring sat-nav and a parking camera.

It also comes with front and rear parking sensors, cruise control, auto wipers, a DAB radio, a heated steering wheel and front seats, plus LED front foglights.

Go for the Hyundai i40 Tourer SE Business, which was aimed at company drivers, and you’ll find ventilated front leather seats and keyless entry.

The Hyundai i40 Tourer Premium tops the lot with a tailgate that opens automatically when you stand close to the rear of the car with the smart key pressed for three seconds, 18-inch alloys, heated rear seats and a panoramic sunroof.