Hyundai Creta : The rain was pelting down outside Hyundai’s showroom in Mumbai last month. Ahead of me, three disparate families were eyeing the same car – the just face-lifted Creta.
A salesperson, sheepishly, informed me that test drives were scheduled full for at least two weeks.
“It’s been like this since the facelift came out,” he said with a shrug, nodding toward the packed showroom floor. “Everybody’s looking towards the new Creta.
This scene, which plays out in showrooms across the country, tells you everything you need to know about Hyundai’s midsize SUV sensation.
In a market as varied and finicky as ours, the Creta has achieved something really special – reaching a consensus across a variety of customer segments, geographies and use criteria.
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Hyundai Creta The Design That Turns Heads
The new Creta has a design evolution that the eyes cannot miss! The somewhat conservative styling of the original is gone, replaced with a front fascia that lets you know this car means business.
At the front end, the parametric grille spans the front between the unique, H-shaped LED daytime running lights now familiar among the Hyundai lineup.
“We wanted something that stood out on the roads,” said Naveen Kumar, a Hyundai product specialist I spoke to at a dealer event in Delhi.
“Look at the Indian consumer; they are design-conscious now. They want their car to be iconic.”
And make a statement it does. In the week I spent with a Creta Knight Edition (it’s the blacked-out one, with a little extra dash of aggression), I couldn’t keep track of the number of double-takes and blink-and-you-miss-it shots with phones from passersby in traffic.
Outside Jaipur, at a highway dhaba, the college-age son of the owner spent 15 minutes walking around the car and asking me about the features, the kind of performance and so on.
What’s really clever about the design is that it can be interestingly distinctive but without being polarizing.
Proportions are still fundamentally pleasing and there the right amount of height and width, (and those muscular wheel arches and shoulders) that give it the substantial presence that Indian SUV buyers are after.
“They’ve really walked the line,” said Rajiv Mehta, an automotive designer who, when I shared images of the Knight Edition, replied that they’d managed to thread the needle beautifully.
“It’s contemporary and edgy but it doesn’t push away more conservative buyers. That’s really hard to do.”
Hyundai Creta The Interior That Welcomes
Climb into the Creta and the consideration in design extends inside the cabin as well.
There is a dual-screen dashboard that is beautifully integrated from behind the steering wheel to the center console.
Physical buttons for climate control are still present (thankfully), bucking the all-touchscreen trend that has left simple functions unduly complex in some rivals.
The thing that impressed me most though was the way the Creta’s cabin manages to feel sophisticated, yet it doesn’t appear fragile.
Supple but firm leatherette seats in the top-spec model have supportive bolstering, and I had no complaint at the end of a four-hour highway stretch.
The sunroof is of the panoramic kind – something Indian buyers still rejoice in and it lets in a lot of light, making the cabin feel much larger than its size would suggest.
“We did a lot of testing for Indian conditions,” Kumar told me. “The cabin cooling system, for instance, was benchmarked to bring the cabin from 50 degrees to 25 in under three minutes – so vital for the kind of summers we experience in places like Rajasthan and Gujarat.”
This refinement also extends to smaller details such as the location of USB ports (set to enable the use of a phone while it’s charging), the height of the door armrests (the arm length of the average Indian is used as a guide) and even the texture of the door handles (its designers intended that you could operate them with wet hands during the monsoon season).
While living with the car, these little touches added up, meaning the Creta was a delight to live with, not a compromise – an important distinction for a car that, for most buyers, is the proper family car.
Hyundai Creta Performance That Satisfies
Powertrains on offer under the hood of the Creta include a trio – a 1.5-litre naturally aspirated petrol (115 PS), a 1.5-litre diesel (116 PS) and the enthusiast’s pick – a 1.5-litre turbocharged petrol that puts out 160 PS.
Both are available with manual or automatic ‘boxes, the turbo-petrol featuring a slick-shifting 7-speed dual-clutch automatic.
The turbo-petrol version I drove packed a performance that would have been unthinkable in a mainstream Indian SUV until a few years ago.
The 0-100 km/h blast occupies about 9.5 seconds, and in-gear acceleration – important for overtaking on single-lane highways – is really strong.
Even around the twisties en route Lonavala, the Creta was poised and felt sure-footed, offering just the right amount of body roll and predictable handling.
“India’s highways have improved so much,” noted experienced automobile journalist Sanjay Sharma as we chatted over coffee about the Creta.
“Now consumers want to be able to take an SUV on the highway at high three-digit speeds and feel comfortable in it, and that’s more than just getting from point A to point B in an urban environment.” That is what the Creta provides.
But it’s probably the diesel version that captures Hyundai’s appreciation of India best.
Where other firms have given up on diesels because of increasingly stringent emissions legislation, Hyundai realised that for many buyers – especially those who regularly cover long distances – the economy and torque characteristics of an effective diesel still hold great appeal.
“Close to 40% of our Creta sales are still diesel,” said Rajesh Singh, a Hyundai dealer in Gujarat. “Those customers are driving 1,500-2,000 kilometers a month and are making a rational pension on the cost of ownership.”
Surpasses All Expectations With This High Quality Feature Alongside These Premium Quality Features
Where the Creta truly stands out from rivals is in its feature set, which has consistently raised the bar in the segment.
The higher versions come with ventilated front seats (an absolute blessing in Indian summers), and a premium 8-speaker Bose sound system, and a fully-featured 10.25-inch infotainment system with connected car tech.
Standard safety gear is also equally impressive, with six airbags, electronic stability control, vehicle stability management, and hill-start assist control fitted on the majority of models.
On more upscale trims, there’s even a blind-spot view monitor which shows you a view of your blind spot in the instrument cluster when you signal — it’s the sort of feature that used to only be found in top-end luxury cars costing three times as much.
On my test drive, I would say the ADAS systems, from the ‘limited’ experience that I had, was decently-tuned for Indian conditions.
The adaptive cruise control was reasonably spaced from the car ahead, the lane-hold assist applying mild corrections rather than the sometimes sharply chivvying interventions which render some others useless on Indian roads.
“My father is 72 and finds long drives tiring these days,” said Amit Verma, a Creta owner I met at a highway rest stop.
“The driver assistance features give him the confidence to continue driving on his own. That for him is a huge thing.”
Hyundai Creta The Ownership Experience
Maybe the single most potent thing about the Creta promise isn’t something you can see sitting in a show room or after a test drive – it’s hidden in that ownership life you live over a few years.
Hyundai has over 1,300 service points across India and has standardized the labor rates and transparent pricing, which makes Hyundai one of the most hassle free car to maintain.
It comes with a 3-year/unlimited km warranty for peace of mind and the resale values are among the best in segment.
“When I sold my 4-year-old first-generation Creta, I got 73% of my purchase price,” bragged Priya Sharma, who recently upgraded to the new model. “That doesn’t happen with most other brands.”
This interplay of strong after-sales and residual value generates a virtuous circle that culminates in astonishing brand loyalty.
Hyundai’s data shows that more than 60% of Creta buyers are either Hyundai repeat purchasers or are recommended by the latter’s customers, thereby fulfilling the aspirations of satisfied ownership.
Hyundai Creta Cultural Relevance of Designing Beyond the Blueprint
Perhaps the most fascinating aspect of the Creta phenomenon is that it has managed to upset the traditional automotive metrics and become a cultural icon, all in the same breath.
For those who live in smaller cities and towns, it’s achievement and arrival. And in the city, it’s a sign of pragmatic elegance when in the big town — polished but never pretentious.
“The Cretarepresents a psychological sweet spot in the Indian pecking order,” noted sociologist Meena Rao, who studies consumer behaviour in developing economies.
“There was this vibe,” she added, “that it’s aspirational but attainable, premium but practical. Few products do that balance.”
This positioning of cultural resonance has helped keep the Creta’s momentum going despite newer rivals cutting in to offer the same experience, frequently with such aggressive price points.
And then there’s the Hyundai badge; a badge that when married to the nameplate ‘Creta’, has built up equity that goes beyond just being transport.
After handing back the test car at the end of my week with it, I understood this bond much better.
The Creta isn’t perfect — no car is — but it gives Indian families what is at the top of their automotive priority list: reliability, comfort, bells and whistles, status and the feeling that you’ve made a decision that others also hold in high esteem.
And in a market as varied — and demanding — as India, that’s not just good product planning: It’s something approaching automotive alchemy.
