Hyundai has given their little trooper a facelift, as announced in India, which is set to provide the car with a series of changes to the exterior, minor updates to the interior, but a retention of powertrains, enhanced safety, and other improvements.
Starting at the front, we can see that the exterior gains a new appearance, consisting of a redesigned grille, restyled headlight surrounds, and a new lower bumper.
Side profile changes are a new cladding design that has an exposed bolting look, new wheels, and two new colors to choose from: Golden Bronze and Titanium Black Matte. The rear gets a new lower bumper and a spoiler - yes, a spoiler.
Inside, little to no changes have occurred, but there is a new flat-bottom steering wheel, and a navy-on-grey color scheme is adopted for the whole cabin. Whether or not we get this colorway in our models for SA remains to be seen. When you squint your eyes a bit more, you can also see that Hyundai has made an effort to tweak the layout of the dashboard.
The lack of change does mean that the car still has a 8 inch infotainment screen, auto AC, push button start/stop, a sunroof and cruise control. For safety the Exter has six airbags, ESC, a rear parking sensors, Tyre pressure monitoring system and ISOFIX points.
Under the bonnet, you will still receive a 1.2L 4 cylinder N/A unit which outputs 61kW and 114nm. This will be driven via a 5 speed manual or a 5 speed AMT through the front wheels.
As it stands, the Exter is available in five model trims, starting off at R 269,900 to the top-of-the-range model, which costs R 314,900. In the pricing bracket, it faces an evolving segment that now has new competitors from other India-built cars like the Tata Punch and the recently updated Citroën C3. It shall be interesting to see where South African consumers flock to, as this car is expected to arrive towards the end of 2026.