Hyundai was never a big name in anything beyond small crossovers in the SUV industry. The Hyundai Palisade changed that by putting the South Korean marque on the larger end of the SUV map. Now, the biggest SUV gets a bold refresh. The 2023 Hyundai Palisade adds a stronger design, more tech, and an XRT model.
We flew from Dubai all the way to South Korea to drive the GCC-spec 2020 Hyundai Palisade midsize SUV and see if it has what it takes to compete in this hotly-contested segment.
Hyundai is on a roll. The Korean brand have wet their feet in every mainstream category there is, with a decent amount of success thanks to good design and great value. However, they’ve been conspicuously absent from the large SUV market. Their largest SUV was the decidedly midsize Hyundai Grand Santa Fe. But now they have the all-new 2020 Palisade — a slightly-bigger midsize SUV.
Even though the Grand Santa Fe is quite a decently proportioned SUV, Hyundai realised that there still is some room left at the top to fill. So here is the Hyundai Palisade, an eight-seater SUV that seems to want to take on full-size SUVs with a crossover platform, more like the Honda Pilot than the Toyota Land Cruiser.