Kia Niro EV vs Nissan ARIYA

The Nissan ARIYA costs £2,005 more than the Kia Niro EV. For that premium it adds 80 kW faster peak rapid charging. The Kia Niro EV is not just cheaper - it also offers 37 miles more WLTP range. On EVcarsguide's combined category scores, the Nissan ARIYA comes out ahead overall.

The Kia Niro EV is £2,005 cheaper to buy. Running costs are almost identical - about £168 a year either way, at 8,000 miles on an off-peak home tariff. Add 5 years of charging and the Kia Niro EV comes out roughly £1,965 cheaper overall. These figures cover list price and home charging only - insurance, servicing, tyres and depreciation will move the real total.

EVcarsguide estimates a real-world motorway range of about 194 miles for the Kia Niro EV and 209 miles for the Nissan ARIYA - effectively matched, and both well below their WLTP figures because sustained high speed is the hardest case for an EV.

The two are within 25 mm on width, so neither is meaningfully easier to thread into a tight space. In a standard 2,400 mm bay that leaves about 575 mm of total clearance for the Kia Niro EV and about 550 mm of total clearance for the Nissan ARIYA. The Kia Niro EV also turns in a 0.9 m tighter circle, which helps with U-turns and multi-storey ramps.

Over a 8-year ownership window EVcarsguide's degradation model projects roughly 84% battery health for the Kia Niro EV and 84% for the Nissan ARIYA. That is close enough that capacity loss should not decide between them. Both use NMC-type cells, so for daily use keep the charge limit near 80% to slow degradation.