Hyundai manufactures the four-door Santa Cruz compact pickup vehicle. The Santa Cruz is Hyundai’s first 4-door pickup truck offered in the North American market, and it will go on sale in 2021 for the 2022 model year. The car features a unibody chassis architecture instead of the ladder frame used in most pickup trucks and is based on the Tucson crossover SUV. According to industry observers, the Santa Cruz is more likely to draw car or crossover buyers than owners of larger, more traditional pickup trucks.
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The genuinely compact pickup is revived with the Hyundai Santa Cruz.
The brand-new 2022 Hyundai Santa Cruz is a two-row, crew-cab style vehicle that is aimed at city people seeking weekend getaways. The tiny pickup holds four adults in the cabin and has space for their belongings in the bed. It is the manufacturer’s first consumer pickup truck of any size or design to be marketed in the U.S.
An adequate amount of luggage and recreational equipment may fit in the pickup bed’s four feet, and a locking, metal roll-up tonneau cover keeps them safe and secure. The tonneau is a sensible feature that will probably be a well-liked factory option. In addition, the Santa Cruz has a lockable storage space built into the floor of the bed, similar to the Honda Ridgeline’s bed storage box.
The Hyundai Santa Cruz, which costs $24,000, is a truck that drives like an SUV, making it the ideal vehicle for adventures.
- The 2022 Hyundai Santa Cruz is unlike anything else on the market, being both a pickup and an SUV.
- It has a modest but surprisingly adaptable truck bed and costs $24,000.
- It’s the ideal vehicle for weekend activities since it combines SUV proportions with pickup-truck functionality.
Three different people approached me and asked the identical question in the course of just one afternoon while I was driving Hyundai’s new pickup truck, the 2022 Santa Cruz: “What the heck is that thing?”
If we didn’t live in a time when many people’s social skills have completely vanished, much like their early-pandemic sourdough starters or their desire to dress oneself below the Zoom line, I imagine the figure would have been higher.
The majority of folks haven’t actually seen a Santa Cruz up close because it only came onto the scene this summer. However, there’s another reason why people always ask inquiries and give Hyundai’s small truck perplexed looks: it’s freakin’ strange.
The Santa Cruz is unlike anything else you can purchase today, occupying the odd space between a pickup and an SUV. In essence, Hyundai took an SUV, removed a sizable portion of the roof, and added a tiny truck bed where the trunk should have been.
Although the end result sounds horrifying, it flawlessly combines the functionality of a pickup truck with the comfortable form and feel of an SUV. The Santa Cruz is a brilliantly funky response to the big trucks and generic crossovers that rule US roadways, and it is in a league of its own.
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Review and compare the 2023 Hyundai Santa Cruz with our expert opinions.
Although the Hyundai Santa Cruz is an unusual pickup truck, many drivers will find it to be the ideal vehicle.
Do Hyundai pickup trucks exist?
Although the Hyundai Santa Cruz is an unusual pickup truck, many drivers find it to be the ideal vehicle. It has the practicality and driving qualities of a compact SUV similar to the Hyundai Tucson on which it is based thanks to its small size, car-like chassis, and capacious 4-door body.
Has Hyundai ever produced a full-size truck?
In conclusion, the only Hyundai pickup truck is the Santa Cruz from 2022. It is a unibody vehicle around the same size as the Ford Maverick. It has plenty of storage and can tow a moderate amount of weight despite its compact size. The tech-filled interior of the vehicle feels opulent, especially in higher grades. This model won’t take the place of your work truck, but it might make a great midsize truck, crossover, or SUV substitute.
What category does the Hyundai Santa Cruz fall under?
The Santa Cruz of 2022 is proof that appearances can be deceiving. It appears to be Hyundai’s contemporary take on the pickup truck at first impression. However, a short visit to the Hyundai website reveals that the Santa Cruz is not included in the brand’s truck lineup. In actuality, there isn’t even a truck segment. Hyundai, on the other hand, labels the Santa Cruz as the newest member of its SUV family and categorizes it as a Sport Adventure Vehicle, placing it with other SUVs like the Tucson, Santa Fe, and Palisade.
Despite being Hyundai’s first truck, the Santa Cruz isn’t a truck in the conventional sense. The Santa Cruz shares a unibody platform with the well-liked Tuscon, as opposed to the conventional body-on-frame framework that manufacturers have used for years to build trucks. Hyundai extended the wheelbase and added a bed to the best-selling SUV to transform it into a functional truck.
In the automotive industry, using a unibody platform appears to be an increasing trend. For instance, the recent introduction of Chevrolet’s 2024 Silverado EV attracted attention by combining elements from body-on-frame and unibody platforms. How does this impact the Santa Cruz, then? It entails taking the wheel of a car with an SUV-like driving style but a truck’s mobility and capability.
A 2020 Hyundai truck’s price.
Although the two pickups’ characteristics are extremely similar, the Maverick has a lower starting price of at $19,995 (plus a $1,495 destination fee). The top Lariat trim of it starts at $25,490. But with upgrades, additional AWD, and a more potent 2.0-liter EcoBoost engine, it approaches the $40,000 mark.
Hyundai is there a Santa Cruz for 2023?
The pickup truck on a unibody platform enters its second model year with the 2023 Hyundai Santa Cruz. The new Night package for the vehicle broadens the brand’s product offering. Prices have increased by as much as $1,780 throughout the lineup.
All-wheel drive and every piece of equipment from the SEL Activity trim level are included in the Santa Cruz Night grade. This model has a 2.5-liter turbocharged four-cylinder engine and an eight-speed dual-clutch transmission in place of the 2.5-liter normally aspirated engine.
A Santa Cruz—is it a truck?
The Santa Cruz blends the practicality of a compact truck with quirky styling and a fun-to-drive attitude. It costs a little more than its primary competition, the Ford Maverick, and the style might not be to everyone’s taste, but the extensive list of features and the high-end interior more than make up for the higher price.
What size bed does a Hyundai Santa Cruz have?
—the truck bed of the Hyundai Santa Cruz is surprisingly roomy. The Santa Cruz is equipped for almost everything, with a truck bed that is about four feet long and around 27 cubic feet in volume.
Who produces the Santa Fe truck?
Although Hyundai expanded the Santa Fe portfolio for 2022 with the tough-looking XRT variant, there aren’t many other significant variations between the 2021 and 2022 vehicles. The Hyundai Santa Fe has seen the following significant alterations over the past few model years: launched the XRT trim in 2022
Is there a trunk on the Hyundai Santa Cruz?
The new Hyundai Santa Cruz is a “business in the front and party in the back” automobile, and mullets are once again in vogue. The Santa Cruz is selling like hotcakes out of nowhere, which may be partially due to the fact that it differs in form and functionality from every other product on the market. It even overcame Chevy’s Corvette to become the nation’s fastest-selling new automobile last month.
Hyundai designed the Santa Cruz with numerous clever features that make it intriguingly practical for parents, notably in the bed trunk. If you have active children, you are aware of their propensity for grossly filthy and foul-smelling socks, shoes, clothes, team uniforms, and equipment. In a typical family-friendly SUV, this implies that you are compelled to keep anything offensive in the car with you after a game or practice and cannot get out of it. Additionally, if it’s extremely muddy (imagine attending a football or soccer practice in the rain), the back of the SUV will become a muck, which requires vacuuming.
As a remedy, the brand is promoting its quirky new Santa Cruz SUV-pickup combination. The Santa Cruz has the functionality of a trunk with the option to hose out the entire thing when you need to decontaminate it, along with features pickup truck users look for like heavy duty cargo D-rings, an adjustable utility track rail and cleat system, and sidewall bed storage compartments. The tonneau cover was installed at the factory (not available on the base model, optional on SEL, and standard on SEL Premium and Limited trims). You can store anything there, from fresh fish on ice to enough Gatorade for the basketball team, thanks to lockable underfloor storage with a drain plug.
I particularly like the under-seat storage bin, which is reminiscent of the Ford Maverick’s ingenious under-seat storage. There is enough capacity for a few footballs or a ton of snacks, which, as I’ve come to discover, is essential for surviving when dealing with a hangry (hungry/angry) child. The first rule is to always keep food available to placate your tiny animals. Actually, even if you don’t have children, this storage space is great for dog treats, water bowls, and other items of the sort. It also works for dogs.
When your hands are occupied with children and equipment, the tailgate’s ability to open without using your hands is crucial. With small children, you could use the key fob to unlock the trunk, take the stroller apart with one hand, and then pull the tonneau cover closed using the included strap.
It’s obvious that this car wasn’t designed exclusively for families, but because it’s useful, parents like it. It won’t stink up the entire car if you leave backpacks, stinky socks, sandy towels, or wet bathing suits in the bed and forget about them for three days. When you get weary of it and your children are old enough to fit a dorm room’s worth of belongings in the back, you may give it to them with warranty left over (10 years/100,000 miles on the powertrain).
Is the Hyundai Santa Cruz cozy?
One of the best interiors among mid-size trucks is found inside the Santa Cruz. Hyundai has developed a reputation for producing cars with stylish materials and in-demand contemporary amenities that would fit in perfectly with more expensive models. We like that it has a conventional shifter on the center console rather than a fussy rotary knob or push-button configuration because it is the first truck in its class to provide a fully digital gauge cluster. The Santa Cruz is only offered with a four-door crew cab, and both the front and rear passenger compartments are competitive with those of trucks of a comparable size. Its about four-foot-long cargo bed is one of the smallest in the market, but it is quite adaptable thanks to a lockable tonneau cover and a practical in-bed trunk that is similar to what the Honda provides.
How durable are Hyundai Santa Cruz vehicles?
- Midsize Santa Fe SUVs from Hyundai are well-known for their dependability. Owners frequently write off between 150,000 and 200,000 miles just for routine maintenance.
- The easiest approach to increase the likelihood that a Hyundai Santa Fe will last 200,000 miles is to regularly service it. Every 3,000 to 5,000 miles, oil and filter changes are also included.
- Santa Fes from the first generation are incredibly dependable. In later years, reports of engine and gearbox failure, particularly with the 2.4L powerplant, were a problem.
- From 2013 through 2018, a new 2.0L turbocharged engine was installed in Santa Fe SUVs. Too many reports, too, describe failures prior to 100,000 miles.
- The newest Santa Fes, which go on sale in 2019, are the most trustworthy models yet. A fourth-generation Santa Fe should last a very long time based on the limited powertrain concerns.