Attending an auto show used to be a high point of my year, so I have wondered why this year’s Seattle event was so disappointing. Could it be harder to impress an old fart who has “seen everything”?
Geography could also be a factor: Seattle’s show is pretty small compared to its big brother down in Los Angeles, so it didn’t have any major reveals.
Beyond all that, 2026 doesn’t strike me as a high point for the American auto industry. Most models are hold-overs, and the few new ones are uninspiring — if not downright ugly.
Whatever the reasons, I have had photos from the auto show rotting away in my computer since November. So let’s bite the bullet and look at a few choice examples. To make this article manageable I am focusing narrowly on Subaru, Honda and Hyundai-Kia.
Subaru goes all in on the Tonka Toy look
Take the redesigned Subaru Outback (please!). The catsup oracles decided that the venerable all-wheel-drive wagon needed to be turned into a full-fledged sport-utility vehicle even though it had been selling an admirably steady 150,000-to-160,000 units per year during the first half of the 2020s. That wasn’t very far below the lower-priced and smaller Forester.
The new Outback is almost two inches higher (68.1 inches), an inch-and-a-half wider (75.8 inches), and has more headroom and cargo capacity due to a boxier shape (Gluckman, 2025).
I suppose one could argue that people want more room these days, and Subaru presumably saves on development costs by putting the Outback on the Forester’s platform. However, the big question is whether the Outback is now too similar to Subaru’s other two SUVS — the Forester and the high-end Ascent. In light of the Ascent’s declining sales, it might have made more sense to give it a shorter, two-seat version and leave the Outlook as a more car-like wagon.
And then there’s the styling. Whereas once upon a time the Outback was one of the cleaner-looking cars to come from a Japanese automaker, it now has an over-amped Tonka Toy look. To make matters worse, it takes some discernment to quickly tell the difference between an Outback and a Forester.
Whatever happened to Honda?
Once upon a time I pretty much only bought Hondas. They had clean, almost Germanic styling and were arguably more roadworthy than competing Toyotas. Yet I found them to be reasonably reliable.
While walking around the Honda display at the auto show I tried to resurrect some old enthusiasm for the brand — but I just couldn’t manage it. Say what you will about the current state of Honda’s engineering, but I just can’t stomach the brand’s design direction.
A case in point is the Prelude. In general, sporty coupes are an endangered species these days, but Honda sure isn’t helping matters. The design of the new Prelude strikes me as odd rather than cool, with its hunchback roofline and platypus nose.
Even Car and Driver magazine had trouble giving the Prelude an endorsement, noting that it is “charming” but “doesn’t pencil out” compared to other sporty coupes. That’s partly because of its front-wheel-drive layout and lack of a manual transmission (Capparella, 2026).
I would also point to the car’s styling, which isn’t worth the space limitations of a low-slung coupe. A Civic Type R makes more sense if one wants a high-performance compact.
Hyundai-Kia: The best and the worst
Hyundai and Kia deserve credit for coming out of nowhere to become some of the most well-rounded brands in the U.S. auto industry. Although they have a minimal presence in the truck field, they have been reasonably successful in covering pretty much everywhere else — from economy cars and electric vehicles to minivans and luxury cars. Such a broad lineup could prove to be a critically important advantage over the next few years given the unusual degree of uncertainties hovering over the industry.
The two Korean brands have also been unusually aggressive in exploring nascent design trends. This has both a good and bad side. For example, the Hyundai Ioniq6 arguably represents a breakthrough in advanced aerodynamics (it’s too bad this design came out after sedans have been eclipsed by SUVs).
On the other side of the coin, both brands have been leading champions of sci-fi styling. Sometimes it works, but other times Hyundais and Kias can remind me of Virgil Exner’s weirder designs.
For example, the Kia K5 sedan is a leading discipline of wildly squiggling lighting both front and rear. It’s certainly distinctive, but will it withstand the test of time? I suspect not any better than a 1961 Plymouth.
The Kia EV6 is more successful in its lighting treatment — particularly in the rear. However, a facelift has given the front a boomerang quality. That’s a downgrade from the lovely feathered headlights on previous models (go here).
And then there’s the postmodern Kia EV9, which powerfully illustrates the fine line between clever and stupid.
Hyundai has also explored unusual lighting treatments. At least to my eyes, the most aesthetically successful approach has been on models such as the Santa Cruz, which has a constellation of horizontal mini-lights. But then there’s the Palisade, with stacked vertical lights that make the SUV look inordinately tall and boxy.
How will auto historians look at the 2026 models?
This is a small sampling of 2026 cars, but I think it gives a flavor for the road that contemporary design has taken.
As an old fart I don’t expect current trends to always appeal to my sensibilities. However, I would not be surprised if the current zeitgeist is someday remembered as fondly as Detroit’s 1958 models. In other words, as an evolutionary wrong turn.
NOTES:
Sales figures from Good Car, Bad Car (2026).
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RE:SOURCES
- Capparella, Joey; 2026. “2026 Honda Prelude Is a Charming Coupe That Doesn’t Pencil Out.” Car and Driver. Posted Posted Jan. 27.
- Gluckman, David; 2025. “2026 Subaru Outback vs. 2025 Subaru Outback: How They Compare.” Car and Driver. Posted April 16.
- Good Car, Bad Car; 2026. Sales figures for individual nameplates. Accessed March 19.
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