KGM Actyon K50 long-term test: value SUV plays a mainstream game

What was less expected is the quality of the interior. The Actyon genuinely holds its own next to mainstream rivals in terms of sturdiness, materials and design. When you sit in the driver’s seat, on the leather and suede seats, and look out across the neatly stitched dash with its 12.3-inch central touchscreen and digital driver’s display, you aren’t instantly reminded that you’ve saved £3,000 over an equivalent Kia. 

The infotainment system gives the game away a little, though. You often have to prod the screen more than once to make inputs and although it has Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, they aren’t wireless. 

There’s a fixed panel for the heating and ventilation controls, so they’re always within reach, but I find the areas you have to push a bit fiddly and too small to use while you’re driving. There’s loads of storage, though, including wide door pockets and a big central bin, as well as powered, ventilated and heated front seats, heated rear seats, sunblinds on the back doors, 360-degree cameras and a powered tailgate. You couldn’t really expect much more in a sub-£40k family car. 

So far, then, things are looking promising for our new long-term test car, but despite this, the first few weeks with the KGM haven’t all been sweetness and light. Our biggest concern is its performance. It uses a 1.5-litre petrol engine with 161bhp that’s used to drive the front wheels, and it highlights how spoiled we’ve become by the punchy acceleration of EVs in today’s market. The 10.8-second 0-62mph sprint feels pretty slow and you often find yourself having to work the engine quite hard to get out of junctions or up hills, at which point it can sound harsh. There’s also a tendency towards  wheelspin on greasy roads with the steering set to anything other than straight ahead. 

It’s early days, but there’s a wide variation in the fuel economy we get from the Actyon, too. Although as much as 40mpg is possible on the motorway, around town it struggles to get out of the mid-twenties. Officially, it should do 33.1mpg combined, which feels about right as an average, but higher engine revs have a big impact on fuel efficiency. 

But probably the biggest drawback, so far, is the ride quality, which is choppy to say the least. On urban roads, with the usual assault course of drain covers and potholes, the Actyon isn’t as comfortable as others in its class, although matters improve on smoother surfaces. On the open road you also have to get used to the bleeping from the lane-departure warning system, together with its regular tugs on the steering wheel. Happily, you can turn these driver aids off through a sub-menu on the infotainment system and there’s a ‘favourites’ shortcut on the chunky hexagonal steering wheel as well. 

*Insurance quote from AA (0800 107 0680) for a 42-year-old in Banbury, Oxon, with three points.