Kia Telluride Breezes Past Stricter IIHS Safety Tests

Kia's popular 2024 Telluride has been awarded the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety's highest accolade, with the strong-selling family SUV receiving the Top Safety Pick+ from the IIHS. Kia's best-selling model, the 2024 Sportage, managed to clinch the Top Safety Pick rating.

This comes after the IIHS introduced even stricter safety criteria to improve vehicle occupant and pedestrian protection. As a result, vehicles have to achieve much higher scores in crash evaluation. A 'Good' rating is required in the side protection test, while a 'Good' or 'Acceptable' rating is now necessary in the updated pedestrian front crash prevention test.

The IIHS now conducts this test in daylight and dark to ensure these pedestrian protection systems work as they should at night. In addition, the IIHS upgraded its moderate front overlap test, which includes a second dummy positioned behind the driver's seat.

Following the performance of the Sportage and Telluride, the IIHS said both vehicles offer the «highest level of protection for both vehicle and occupants and vulnerable road users.»

Even the entry-level Sportage LX receives a comprehensive list of safety features. Forward collision-avoidance tech (with car, pedestrian, and cyclist detection) is standard alongside lane-keep assist, lane departure warning, safe exit warning, rear occupant alert, driver attention warning, and lane-following assist. For 2024, rear airbags were included as part of the new model year update.

The Telluride LX (also the base model) impresses with all the equipment mentioned above, as well as Intelligent Speed Limit Assist, Highway Driving Assist 1.5, and Navigation-based Smart Cruise Control w/Stop and Go functionality.

«We fully support the IIHS's initiatives to enhance road safety, and we are aligned in our commitment to meet the agency's more rigorous standards. Safety remains one of our top priorities, and we're dedicated to driving continuous advancements in this critical area every day, as we proved with 2024 Telluride!» remarked Steve Center, COO of Kia America.

The United States still has a significant problem regarding road safety, with thousands of road deaths recorded yearly. Despite