I drove the $62,000 Kia EV6 GT — a genius electric SUV with supercar speed. Here are 8 things it taught me.

• We recently spent a week with Kia's new EV6 electric crossover, which starts at $49,000. 
• The GT trim we drove starts at $62,000, and it accelerates at supercar speeds. 
• The car taught us eight important things about itself — and electric vehicles as a whole.

I heard a lot of great things about the Kia EV6 GT before driving one myself. Friends and colleagues raved about its sleek new looks and lightning speed, and after a week with the car, I now do the same.

But I don't just want to tell you about that, because you've probably heard it. I want to tell you eight other things I learned while driving the EV6 GT.

1. The Kia EV6 GT is genius

The EV6 is Kia's new electric crossover, and it starts at $48,700. The GT is the performance trim, with nearly 600 horsepower and lime-green brake calipers. 

One of my favorite parts about the EV6 I drove was how it blended touchscreen and tactile controls. There's a line of buttons and knobs on the dashboard, and they're screens themselves.

With the press of a button, they reprogram from climate to infotainment controls. The "tune" and "volume" knobs become temperature dials, while the radio buttons become fan adjustments.

—Alanis King (@alanisnking) May 3, 2023

It's hard to remember to switch back and forth at first, but you appreciate the ingenuity of it as soon as you're used to it. Plus, I hate when interiors are fully touchscreen — you end up having to poke around with no tactile cues, which is distracting while you drive.

2. The EV6 is also even faster than I thought

Electric cars are known for speed, mainly due to instant torque.

Traditional gas cars have a torque curve — basically, you hit the accelerator and the car builds toward its peak torque (and peak power). There's no buildup with instant torque, and the car effortlessly shoots forward as soon as you hit the pedal.

I knew all of that going in, yet the performance in the EV6 GT was still startling. The car launches with the slightest tap of the pedal, shifting the gravity in your core and magnetizing to the road. It's not just lightning fast; it feels safe and controlled. 

3. We're in a golden age for EV performance 

When I sat back and thought about how fast the EV6 is, I had a broader realization: Right now, this is new. A fast Kia crossover is startling because Kia crossovers aren't supposed to be fast.

But eventually, as EVs from mainstream automakers get more popular, this will be the norm. Everyone will have instant torque, and it won't be special anymore. I'm going to enjoy it while it is. 

4. One-pedal driving is king

In an EV, you can choose to drive with just one pedal. This happens through a process called regenerative braking, where instead of the driver using the brake pedal, the car slows itself down when their foot comes off the accelerator.

The driver can choose from different levels of regen where the braking gets harsher, and the kinetic energy captured from regen goes back to the battery to increase its charge.

I've never been sold on one-pedal driving. In the EVs I've tested, I've always felt like the highest level of regen is either too harsh or not harsh enough. But in the EV6, it's perfect — and it's relaxing to sit at stoplights without your foot on the brake.

5. EV speed isn't always worth the money

The three major factors in an EV purchase are often price, performance, and range. Performance is expensive, but it often lowers range. Based on their budget and the charging infrastructure where they live, buyers have to decide what's most important.

The EV6 is a perfect example of this. The cheapest trim is the $48,700 Wind with rear-wheel drive, 225 horsepower, and an EPA-estimated range of 310 miles. Go up to the $61,600 GT, and you'll get 576 throat-in-your-chest horsepower but only 206 miles of range. That means you pay $13,000 more to go 100 fewer miles on a charge.

I love the GT's speed, but ultimately, it's a party trick. If I own the car, I'm not going to be flooring it every second. That's bad for the range, which is already low, and it gets old after a few days. I'd rather spend less on the car and travel farther between charges. 

6. EVs still aren't easy to drive in many places

The range in the EV6 GT was a challenge. I planned to take it to the NASCAR race at Circuit of The Americas, which was a 196-mile round trip through rural Texas with no good charging options along the way. That was dangerously close to my 206-mile range.

I had two options: take a 30-minute detour into Austin to charge the car, or try to go without charging. My husband and I drove to the track on Saturday and Sunday, so we tried both ways. 

The first day, we took the car into Austin and looked for a charger. The best option was on the ninth floor of a parking garage, where we parked for two hours and 32 minutes. It wasn't a fast charger, so we only gained enough battery to cover our trip from the track into Austin. We got home and parked the car with 14 percent battery left. 

To go back to Circuit of The Americas on Sunday, we had to park the EV6 at a public charger all night. (Estimates on the ChargePoint app were 10 hours to a full battery.) That meant we had to drive another car to the charging station and leave it there all day, then swap our belongings between the two when we got home at midnight.

We returned to a full charge on Sunday. We cranked the regen to the max, got to the track with 62 percent left, then got home with 13.

When we pulled up to our town's charger, one plug was taken and the other was broken. We crawled home and tried again later. 

7. You have to rethink EV battery percentages

I feel like we're conditioned to look at battery percentages a certain way: More than 50 is good, less than 50 is iffy, and when the bar turns red, it's time to panic. But you can't think like that in an EV. 

The percentage in an EV isn't the same as on your phone or laptop. You don't hit 20 percent and stop checking notifications until you get a charger. Instead, it's like a fuel gauge: When you have 20 percent left, it's one-fifth of the capacity.

That's a lot of time before you need to charge again. Don't freak out.

8. Stopping to charge isn't always a burden

EV charging is a mindset, just like EV ownership. I had to put extra time, thought, and planning into the route to NASCAR, but that let me savor the trip — instead of rushing back and forth and stopping at gas stations along the way, I went into downtown Austin to charge and hung out with friends.

The day was more leisurely by force. I had to slow down and enjoy myself, and that wasn't a bad thing.