Minor Design Updates And New 1.0L 3-Cylinder Turbo For Facelifted Kia Cee’d Lineup

Following a leaked photo that surfaced on the web earlier this month, Kia has decided to go official with the facelifted Cee’d lineup, which it calls “a comprehensive upgrade”.

The exterior and interior changes apply to all models in the lineup, including the three-door Kia Pro_Cee’d, five-door Cee’d and Cee’d SW. The models also get a new engine, transmission and equipment.

From a visual point of view, the changes are rather subtle and include a more angular and wider bumper with chrome trim around the fog lamps, as well as a new oval-shaped grille mesh.

The rear end features a reshaped bumper too, with LED taillights. Cee’d models also get new 16- and 17-inch alloy wheel designs.

Inside, the facelifted Kia Cee’d gets minor styling updates including chrome accents around the instrument binnacle and the upper edge of the instrument panel, chrome air vents and a gloss black finish for the central fascia panel. Other chrome accents can be found around the base of the gear-stick, on door handles, and to the temperature control dials on the dashboard. There’s also a new optional Brown Pack color package which adds brown upholstery to the seats and doors.

Kia says it has reduced noise, vibration and harshness on diesel models, with the engines also fitted with sound-absorbing material to the engine block, oil pan and diesel particulate filter.

Speaking of engines, the facelifted Kia Cee’d range gets a new 1.0-liter T-GDI 3-cylinder turbocharged gasoline unit, available in two power units: 100PS (99hp) and 120PS (118hp). Both versions deliver 172Nm (127lb-ft) of peak torque, available from 1,500 to 4,000 rpm.

Kia has introduced some updates to the 1.6-liter CRDi diesel engine, available in two states of tune: 110PS (108hp) and 136PS (134hp). The latter variant gets a bump of 8PS and 20Nm of torque, to 136PS and 285Nm (210lb-ft). Other engines on offer are the 128PS (126hp) 1.6-liter GDI and 100PS (99hp) 1.4-liter MPI petrol units, as well as the 1.4-liter CRDI diesel. All units are Euro6-compliant.

Another major update is the addition of the new 7-speed double-clutch transmission (DCT), available exclusively on models equipped with 136PS 1.6-liter CRDi diesel. With the new transmission, the engine emits 109 g/km CO2, compared to 145 g/km recorded by the earlier engine and six-speed automatic transmission.

Engineers have also modified the suspension and chassis to improve ride comfort and handling, with the main addition being a new torque vectoring system.

Finally, Kia’s Cee’d GT and Pro_Cee’d GT models have received a new turbocharger system for the 204PS (201hp) 1.6-liter T-GDI engine, resulting in a 0.1-second improvement for the 0-100 km/h sprint, which now takes 7.6 seconds. CO2 emissions dropped slightly to 170 g/km.

The updated Kia Cee’d family will be available across Europe from July 2015.