It’s 2025, and there are still ugly cars! The list from last year has not undergone any drastic changes. None of those models were discontinued, and only one—the Nissan Kicks—underwent a major redesign . . . which made it uglier. There is one newcomer that makes an impressive high (or low) debut, which pushed the Hyundai Santa Cruz off the bottom. I suspect it will return someday.
While some companies continue to assault the senses with awful designs (I’m looking at you, Hyundai, Kia, and Nissan), the industry’s bigger problem is blandness. Too many vehicles look . . . fine . . . but nothing sets them apart from anything else. As I have been saying for a few years now, some of the cars on this list are tolerable. When I first started compiling this annual list, the hard part was narrowing it down to only ten. Now it’s hard to find ten truly ugly models. I suppose that’s an improvement.
To qualify for this list, a car must be sold in volume to the general public in the United States. Volume is defined subjectively based on my observations (in other words, if I see them on the roads, they qualify; if I don’t, they don’t). Vehicles are excluded if they are not sold new in North America, sell in very low volume, or are sold only for exotic, military, commercial, or other special purposes.
The following are the ten ugliest cars of the 2025 model year according to me. It’s my opinion. Don’t be offended.
10. Kia Soul
The Kia Soul is still here, long after it should have been put to rest . . . but its days may be numbered. There are rumors that 2025 will be the end of the line for this dumb little econo-box with its hockey-stick taillights and its trying-too-hard vibe. If Kia decides to keep it, it’s due for a redesign. Surely they could do better than #10!
9. Hyundai Venue
Last year I said, “the Venue almost works. From the rear and sides it’s not too bad. Then you see that ‘extreme eyebrows’ front-end and it all falls apart.” It’s a shame, really. Everything wrong with it could be fixed with a cheap mid-cycle ‘facelift’ that trims the eyebrows and straightens out some of unnecessary lumps and oddities. Any day now.
8. Kia Sorento
I really don’t understand why the Korean manufacturers insist on doing these absurd, offensive things with the lights on the front of their cars. What you’re seeing in this photo did not emerge from function, form, taste, or randomness. It’s a choice . . . a very, very bad choice. This was an intentional, malicious act of offensive design.
7. Mercedes GLC Coupe
Since 2016, this list has featured a group of vehicles I call the “German potato brigade”—big SUV-sized four-door hatchbacks from Mercedes and BMW. They don’t look too awful in photos, but in person, when their sheer size is more evident, they are horrible, ugly monstrosities. They also insist on calling them “coupes,” even though they are, by definition, not coupes.
6. BMW X4
Take the Mercedes GLC Coupe [sic], add the worst design elements from BMW’s current product line, and you have the X4. They didn’t put “coupe” in the name, but they still describe them that way . . . because I guess we just don’t care about the meanings of words anymore. Anyway, it’s same as the GLC Coupe [sic] but more angular and more ugly.
5. Mercedes GLE Coupe
Now let’s take the Mercedes GLC Coupe [sic] and, instead of adding extra BMW ugliness, just make it even bigger. Don’t be deceived by the photos; it looks much worse in person. It assaults the senses with its monstrosity, which easily outweighs whatever BMW did to the X4. It’s wrong . . . completely wrong. And it’s still not a coupe.
4. BMW X6
The worst of the four members of the German potato brigade is the BMW X6. It is as monstrous, oversized, and wrong as the Mercedes GLE Coupe [sic], but they added those little BMW extras that amplify the awfulness. The company describes the X6 as a “luxury midsize coupe SUV.” To quote Luke Skywalker, “Amazing. Every word of what you just said was wrong.”
3. Nissan Kicks
The redesigned 2025 Nissan Kicks leaps from #8 to #3 this year. Of the outgoing version I said, “There are so many unnecessary angles. It looks like they just kept designing and designing until they couldn’t design anymore.” That was a criticism, not an invitation to prove how much farther you could go. And what did you do to that front-end?
2. Tesla Cybertruck
The Tesla Cybertruck debuts at #2. You might have expected it to start at the top (or, rather, the bottom), but Elon Musk’s dumpster truck benefits from its intentionality. Every other car on this list was meant to look good but failed miserably. The Cybertruck is like this on purpose. But that only helps so much . . . it’s still extremely ugly.
1. Hyundai Santa Fe
The more I see the new Hyundai Santa Fe, the more I hate it. It’s hideous. The designers stole some elements from Land Rover and Ford, covered the joints with with angular, misshapen bits of metal and plastic they found around the shop, and finished it off with hbrake lights that look (for some reason) like dog bones. Why, Hyundai? Why?
Dishonorable Mention: Lithium Ion Battery Packs
Most of the rechargeable batteries in your phones, laptops, and smartwatches use lithium ion (Li-ion) technology. They are reasonably reliable and can provide sufficient power without adding too much weight . . . but they can lead to dangerous fires. A damaged Li-ion battery can enter a thermal runaway condition that generates toxic, flammable smoke, extreme heat, and a fire that is almost impossible to put out.
In places where such a fire would be especially dangerous—like on an aircraft—the risks are mitigated by requirements that those devices be in your carry-on luggage (where they can be accessed in an emergency) and the presence of special Li-ion fire containment bags that can keep a burning device safely isolated. Li-ion batteries in a thermal runaway state will burn until they run out of fuel; they cannot be extinguished by water, CO2 extinguishers, or any other normal firefighting method.
Cars that run on electricity—whether traditional hybrids, plug-in hybrids, or fully-electric—have huge Li-ion battery packs. These are, of course, designed with reasonable safety precautions in mind. Newer models generally don’t spontaneously combust. But after a serious accident, or if exposed to an external fire, they can end up in a thermal runaway condition and the only thing you—or the firefighters—can do is wait ’til they go out.
When you have a lot of electric cars sitting right next to each other in an enclosed space—like, say, a car-carrying cargo ship—a car’s battery pack going into Li-ion runaway can quickly lead to an unstoppable inferno that destroys the entire vessel and everything aboard. Right now, the Morning Midas, a ship with over 3,000 cars aboard, is burning uncontrollably somewhere near Adak, Alaska. The crew abandoned ship and was rescued, so nobody’s going to die . . . but that’s still a lot of valuable stuff going to waste. And it’s not the first time this has happened.
There’s no easy solution to this problem unless we figure out some other way to make batteries, and, of course, internal combustion vehicles catch fire sometimes too . . . though they’re easier to manage and easier to put out. Li-ion battery packs are a part of life. We should mitigate the risks as best we can. But I hope we, at some point, can find a less ugly way to store our electricity.