Kia’s all-electric PV5 Passenger has been named Best Large Car at the 2026 Autocar Awards, with the British motoring magazine’s judges praising the van-derived people carrier as a rethink of what an electric MPV can be.
Kia Corporation confirmed the win this week, casting it as validation of its purpose-built vehicle (PBV) strategy — a push into modular electric models that can be reconfigured for passenger, cargo and specialist use. Autocar’s panel singled out the PV5 Passenger’s progressive design, clever packaging and value, along with its driving manners and interior layout.
“Besides looking so wonderfully progressive, fresh and unusual, the Kia PV5 is very cleverly packaged, appealing to travel in, really well-mannered to drive – and it’s outstanding value for money,” said Mark Tisshaw, editor of Autocar. He called it “one of the smartest ways you could spend a modest budget on a big family car.”
The PV5 Passenger is built on Kia’s dedicated E-GMP.S platform, an architecture engineered specifically for the PV5 family rather than adapted from a passenger car. Autocar credited that platform for the model’s performance and range, and framed the vehicle as a new benchmark for both electric light commercial vehicles (LCVs) and MPVs.
Kia offers the PV5 Passenger as a five-seater with a choice of two batteries — a 51.5 kWh Standard Range and a 71.2 kWh Long Range pack — and has added a seven-seater in a 2-2-3 layout with 350 litres of luggage space behind the third row. Standard equipment includes a 12.9-inch touchscreen with navigation, Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, a 7.5-inch driver display, and front and rear parking sensors with a reversing camera. Updates for the 2027 model year include a redesigned antenna that drops the vehicle’s overall height below 1.9 metres, a height-adjustable driver’s armrest and walk-away automatic locking.
“The Autocar Award for the Kia PV5 Passenger is strong recognition of our commitment to redefining the electric vehicle experience for customers,” said Sang Dae Kim, executive vice president and head of Kia’s PBV division. He said the model showed how the strategy could “create new value across personal mobility, business use and specialized transportation.”
The PV5 is the first model in that strategy to reach customers, sitting alongside a Cargo variant, with crew, chassis-cab and wheelchair-accessible (WAV) versions planned. Kia is betting that a single flexible platform can serve buyers ranging from families to fleet operators and accessible-transport providers — a contrast to the more conventional electric vans and MPVs it competes against.
The Autocar honour adds to a growing tally for the PV5. It was named 2026 International Van of the Year, a title decided by a jury of European commercial-vehicle journalists, while the PV5 Passenger took Family Car of the Year at the 2026 BBC TopGear.com Awards. Kia has fared well at the Autocar Awards before: the EV3 was named Best Electric Car in 2025, and the EV9 won this same Best Large Car category in 2024.
For Kia, the recognition reinforces a pitch it has leaned on throughout the PV5’s rollout — that a boxy, van-derived EV can double as a credible large family car. With the seven-seat and wheelchair-accessible conversions still to come, the PV5 Passenger’s run of awards looks set to continue.
