The New York Auto Show has hosted the World Car of the Year awards ceremony for nearly 20 years. Guests attending this year’s laurels might have wondered if they would have ended up at the 2022 New York show, with Hyundai taking the same three awards this year as last year. In 2022, the Ioniq 5 won World Car of the Year, World Electric Vehicle and World Car Design of the Year. At this week’s New York show, the Ioniq 6 repeated that trifecta. The battery electric sedan beat out 29 other vehicles with a variety of powertrains, this initial group narrowed down to the BMW X1/iX1, Ioniq 6 and Kia Niro.
The first prize is contested between vehicles sold in at least two major world markets on two continents between January 1, 2022 and March 30, 2023, priced below the level of luxury cars in primary markets and produced in more than 10,000 units during the sales period.
Hyundai won 20 more vehicles for the world electric car title, a category that the WCOTY board inaugurated in 2022. The market qualification is the same here, but there is no price cap and the production threshold is reduced to 5,000. Runners-up in the category are the BMW i7 and the Lucid Air. The consolation prize for the Lucid Air was winning the World Luxury Car award, beating the BMW 7 Series/i7 and the Genesis G90.
All vehicles eligible for any of the WCOTY categories are eligible to win the World Car Design Award, creating a field of 78 entries. A panel of designers including Ian Callum, Patrick le Quement, Tom Matano and Shiro Nakamura narrowed the field down to the Range Rover, Lucid Air and Ioniq 6, handing the blue ribbon to Hyundai.
To top it all off, the Kia EV6 GT won the World Performance Car award ahead of the Toyota GR Corolla and the new Nissan Z, and Hyundai Motor’s design chief Sangyup Lee won the World Car Person of the Year.
The only other manufacturer to take a look this year was Citroën, its C3 taking home the World Urban Car award. You can check the voting standings of the finalists in all categories on the WCOTY website.
