The rear presents the most obvious giveaway, as well as intimations of the Focus RS; a second wing rests atop the Veloster’s normal hatch spoiler, and a trapezoidal diffuser with red highlights encloses twin big-bore pipes. Extra points for the designer’s detailing, though: from the right angle, the triangular brake light merges seamlessly into the rooftop shark fin antenna. The N division’s Performance Blue paint works to good effect; carvings, shadows, and highlights pop in the trademark color. Darker colors, however, might swallow the less-pronounced aspects.

Hyundai chose the path of elegant restraint on the N's exterior, hewing closely to the lines of the standard Veloster and developing a style that falls between the timeless Teutonic speed macine known as the Volkswagen GTI and the cantankerous, erstwhile Ford Focus RS. The differences between the N and regular Veloster are few: in front, there's a gloss black grille underlined by a satin chrome slash, red trim on the front splitter wings, and air curtain winglets ahead of the front wheels; the flanks get high-gloss black mirrors, sharper side sills with red highlighting, and a choice of two unique wheel designs.

Neither one of them, then, would know what to do with the Hyundai Veloster N, a three-door coupe that earns a place in any conversation of the world’s foremost hot hatches.

Before I went on the launch for the new Hyundai Veloster N , I borrowed a 2019 Veloster Turbo R-Spec for a week. Discovering it stalwart fun on a squiggly road, I took my stepsister for a hard ride up a few Pacific coast canyons. She couldn’t believe we were in a Hyundai . When she told her mother about it, her mother—who’d owned a Hyundai minivan in the days when the company hadn’t elevated its reliability to the level of its ambitions—refused to believe it. She would sooner have believed God was in the backyard eating bibimbap and drinking soju than that her daughter and I had a rollicking good time driving a Hyundai.

Hyundai perhaps chose excessive restraint on the inside. On the Turbo R-Spec, thin, bright accent lines on the instrument panel, steering wheel, and seats paid exponential dividends, preventing the sensation of a sarcophagus. In contrast, the only splashes of color in the Veloster N’s cabin are two driving mode buttons on the steering wheel and the Performance Blue seat belts. The accent lines on the instrument panel, also in Performance Blue, could put occupants in a driving mood—were they brighter. As it is, they come off as a faintly translucent blue plastic, unable to break ip the monotony. A skosh more vibrance inside would work wonders. Hyundai deserves a break here, though; no one gets verklempt at the Focus RS, Honda Civic Type R , or VW Golf R cabins, save those who ordered the digital dash in the latter.

But this car is about driving, not dilettantism. There will be two versions of the Veloster N: the standard hatch, and the version enhanced with a performance package. The standard version gets 250 horsepower and the performance version raises that to 275 hp, but both score 260 pound-feet of torque from the 2.0-liter turbo four. The standard car uses brake-based torque vectoring and sits on 18-inch wheels wearing 225/40 Michelin Pilot Super Sports. The performance package plops an electro-hydraulic limited-slip differential on the front axle, adds on 19-inch wheels on 235/35 Pirelli P Zeros tires, and subs in a front roll bar one millimeter smaller to manage understeer. European buyers can also get ‘Ring-grade goods straight from the factory, thanks to a package with lighter 19-inch wheels on Pirelli Trofeo R cup rubber.

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The assembled mass of journalists at the car's launch only had the chance to drive the performance variant for roughly 50 minutes over two days —about 20 minutes doing two laps of the Nurburgring in a lead-follow quartet, and 30 minutes on a pre-set route that primarily involved fast sweepers, with no 180-degree bends. The tightly-managed show prevented the experimentation and lazy fiddling I would have loved to indulge in; nevertheless, my first impression certainly suggests this hot hatch performs exceptionally.

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The electronically adjustable suspension—McPherson strut in front, multilink in back—offers four driving modes that work with some of the car's other systems: Normal, Sport, Eco, and N. The steering’s just a whiff lighter than ideal, even in N mode and especially on the track, but it's nothing worth seeing the manager about. The real issue is artificial feel; from lock to lock, there’s always the impression some hidden machine insists on helping you turn the wheel. It takes high g-force loads for tire feedback to push through and reach your fingertips, but you can always put the wheels where you want them. The only other off note is the crackles and pops during rev-matched downshifting in N mode. Instead of sounding visceral, present and alive, they sound like they’re happening behind a thick wall of cardboard—or like someone’s popping paper bags in the next apartment.

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