Hyundai Ioniq 5 N Bound For Gran Turismo 7

Confirmation that Hyundai’s game-changing performance EV is heading for GT7 has been hidden in plain sight

02 Dec 2024

Normally, we have to wait until a few days before it goes live to know what the contents of a Gran Turismo 7 update will be, but already, we know one of the cars that'll be heading to the game in January 2025: the Hyundai Ioniq 5 N.

Hyundai’s first crack at a performance EV, the 641bhp, dual-motor Ioniq 5 N has mightily impressed us – on our first drive earlier this year, we called it “the first truly great performance EV” and awarded it a full five stars.

Confirmation that it’s on its way to GT7 came as part of the in-game prizes offered to viewers of the finals of the Gran Turismo World Series e-sports competition, which kicks off in Amsterdam next week. Viewing the various different streams will award players with different prizes, with the original online announcement stating that watching the Nations Cup final on 8 December will grant players a to-be-announced prize.

Hidden in plain sight, though, was confirmation of what that prize will be: the Ioniq 5 N. Its addition has now been confirmed in a separate announcement by Polyphony Digital.

It’s no huge surprise that it’s making its way to the game, with an announcement back in May that Hyundai and Gran Turismo would be linking together for “various sim-racing activities.”

We still don’t know what these activities actually entail, although that announcement also sort of, maybe, kinda, possibly hinted that the Pikes Peak Hill Climb could finally be returning to Gran Turismo.

For now, though, the inclusion of the 5 N appears to be the first fruit of this collaboration. Despite the chance to claim it for free coming in a week's time, though, players will have to wait a little longer to actually experience it, as it's been confirmed for the January 2025 update.

With the title's updates traditionally arriving on the last Thursday of the month, we'd expect it to turn up on 30 January. Whether that means we'll be getting any new content for December remains to be seen – the regularity of content updates has slowed a little recently, and it's likely Polyphony is busy readying the free-to-play 'My First Gran Turismo' spinoff.

The first full sentence spoken by an infant Mike was a review of the ride quality of a Volvo 850. It was “Daddy’s car goes bumpy-bump on a bumpy road,” so would probably need proofreading a bit, but it was a start.