2025 KIA CARNIVAL HYBRID

POWER TRAIN

The hybrid car intermittently switches into EV mode after coming to a complete stop (e.g., at a traffic signal or after briefly stopping to pick up my child). When this happens, the vehicle does not accelerate properly once back on the road and feels stuck in EV mode, unable to accelerate beyond ~45 mph. This creates a safety concern when merging or crossing intersections.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

The hybrid car intermittently switches into EV mode after coming to a complete stop (e.g., at a traffic signal or after briefly stopping to pick up my child). When this happens, the vehicle does not accelerate properly once back on the road and feels stuck in EV mode, unable to accelerate beyond ~45 mph. This creates a safety concern when merging or crossing intersections.

ENGINE

The hybrid car intermittently switches into EV mode after coming to a complete stop (e.g., at a traffic signal or after briefly stopping to pick up my child). When this happens, the vehicle does not accelerate properly once back on the road and feels stuck in EV mode, unable to accelerate beyond ~45 mph. This creates a safety concern when merging or crossing intersections.

ENGINE

2025 KIA Carnival Hybrid gets stuck in electric mode. This cause rapid draining of the electric vehicle battery, reduced maximum speed, and reduced acceleration. This has occurred while merging onto the highway. I had to pull over to the highway on ramp shoulder, turn the vehicle off and back, and then merge back until the highway. I have a video of it happening while picking up my kids from school, but it is too large to upload here.

ELECTRICAL SYSTEM

2025 KIA Carnival Hybrid gets stuck in electric mode. This cause rapid draining of the electric vehicle battery, reduced maximum speed, and reduced acceleration. This has occurred while merging onto the highway. I had to pull over to the highway on ramp shoulder, turn the vehicle off and back, and then merge back until the highway. I have a video of it happening while picking up my kids from school, but it is too large to upload here.

POWER TRAIN

The Kia Carnival Hybrid wouldn't allow me to accelerate, topping out at 30/31 MPH despite me fully pressing down on the accelerator. It has happened twice now (a few days apart) and can only be resolved by turning the car off and then back on. Compared to similar complaints logged on the NHTSA website, the difference is that this happened when it was roughly 50-60 degrees outside--not during extremely low temperatures as the other examples have described.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

The Kia Carnival Hybrid wouldn't allow me to accelerate, topping out at 30/31 MPH despite me fully pressing down on the accelerator. It has happened twice now (a few days apart) and can only be resolved by turning the car off and then back on. Compared to similar complaints logged on the NHTSA website, the difference is that this happened when it was roughly 50-60 degrees outside--not during extremely low temperatures as the other examples have described.

ELECTRICAL SYSTEM

When pulling out onto the highway from my drive way the car would no accelerate when I pressed the gas, the car would not exceed 35mph, when caused me and my kids to almost get rear ended when pulling out since the car would not go..... the car will start to flash a " check hybrid system pull over safely" light and then the car will start to coast and I have to find somewhere safe to coast off to, to turn the vehicle off and then on again, it will run fine after that but it will eventually do it again... I have taken the car to 2 different dealerships to have it looked and and they tell me nothing is wrong with it

ENGINE

When pulling out onto the highway from my drive way the car would no accelerate when I pressed the gas, the car would not exceed 35mph, when caused me and my kids to almost get rear ended when pulling out since the car would not go..... the car will start to flash a " check hybrid system pull over safely" light and then the car will start to coast and I have to find somewhere safe to coast off to, to turn the vehicle off and then on again, it will run fine after that but it will eventually do it again... I have taken the car to 2 different dealerships to have it looked and and they tell me nothing is wrong with it

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

When pulling out onto the highway from my drive way the car would no accelerate when I pressed the gas, the car would not exceed 35mph, when caused me and my kids to almost get rear ended when pulling out since the car would not go..... the car will start to flash a " check hybrid system pull over safely" light and then the car will start to coast and I have to find somewhere safe to coast off to, to turn the vehicle off and then on again, it will run fine after that but it will eventually do it again... I have taken the car to 2 different dealerships to have it looked and and they tell me nothing is wrong with it

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

My carnival is only a few weeks old. The first week of driving I was on the freeway and I was suddenly unable to accelerate. The started slowing down and pressing the gas did nothing. I was able to get off to the side of the freeway where I turned off the car. Once the car was back on it was fine. However later in the drive while street driving the same thing happened and I again had to pull over and turn off then on the car again. I explained this to the dealership on the phone thinking it may be an issue with the mode I was driving in. The dealer told me he had heard of this before and I need to switch modes. I have since switched to smart mode where it goes in and out from economy to sport and it failed to accelerate again twice this weekend where I had to pull over and turn off the car. I have an appointment with the dealer however I have no seem posts and complaints of others with this same issue and no resolution. This is extremely dangerous.

POWER TRAIN

Vehicle lost power and would not accelerate past 30 mph even when fully pressing down on the accelerator. After a few minutes a warning flashed to check vehicle hybrid system. Pulling over to the shoulder and restarting the car returned the car to normal operation.

FUEL/PROPULSION SYSTEM

Vehicle lost power and would not accelerate past 30 mph even when fully pressing down on the accelerator. After a few minutes a warning flashed to check vehicle hybrid system. Pulling over to the shoulder and restarting the car returned the car to normal operation.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

Cold winter day, the car would not accelerate past 30-35 MPH. The engine would rev but would not be able to get past about 35 MPH.

ENGINE

Car would not allow me to accelerate. It seemed to keep me running only on the electric motor vs the gas engine (the vehicle is a hybrid). This has happened multiple times. The fix is to turn the car off and on again.

FUEL/PROPULSION SYSTEM

Car would not allow me to accelerate. It seemed to keep me running only on the electric motor vs the gas engine (the vehicle is a hybrid). This has happened multiple times. The fix is to turn the car off and on again.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

Car would not allow me to accelerate. It seemed to keep me running only on the electric motor vs the gas engine (the vehicle is a hybrid). This has happened multiple times. The fix is to turn the car off and on again.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

When driving my van to work in the morning, I would get an alert on my screen that says to check the driver assistance system. Then I turned on to the freeway on ramp and my car lost all power, not letting me drive faster than 30 mph. I was able to get off of the freeway and on to a side street when another alert, accompanied by loud beeps, came on saying “Check Hybrid System. Stop safely.” I was able to pull to the side of the road and turn the car off. When I turned it back on it seemed everything was fine. I took it to the dealership and they couldn’t replicate the problems and the car didn’t register any errors. So they returned it to me. This morning I drove to work and the exact same thing happened at the exact same place. Only this time I wasn’t able to get over as quickly and my car shut down in the middle of an intersection. Luckily I was able to coast to the side of the road. The dealership is still saying they can’t fix what they don’t know is wrong. Which I get, but it’s weird that these major events aren’t being recorded by the car. And it is terrifying to suddenly lose power on the freeway.

ENGINE

When driving my van to work in the morning, I would get an alert on my screen that says to check the driver assistance system. Then I turned on to the freeway on ramp and my car lost all power, not letting me drive faster than 30 mph. I was able to get off of the freeway and on to a side street when another alert, accompanied by loud beeps, came on saying “Check Hybrid System. Stop safely.” I was able to pull to the side of the road and turn the car off. When I turned it back on it seemed everything was fine. I took it to the dealership and they couldn’t replicate the problems and the car didn’t register any errors. So they returned it to me. This morning I drove to work and the exact same thing happened at the exact same place. Only this time I wasn’t able to get over as quickly and my car shut down in the middle of an intersection. Luckily I was able to coast to the side of the road. The dealership is still saying they can’t fix what they don’t know is wrong. Which I get, but it’s weird that these major events aren’t being recorded by the car. And it is terrifying to suddenly lose power on the freeway.

ELECTRICAL SYSTEM

When driving my van to work in the morning, I would get an alert on my screen that says to check the driver assistance system. Then I turned on to the freeway on ramp and my car lost all power, not letting me drive faster than 30 mph. I was able to get off of the freeway and on to a side street when another alert, accompanied by loud beeps, came on saying “Check Hybrid System. Stop safely.” I was able to pull to the side of the road and turn the car off. When I turned it back on it seemed everything was fine. I took it to the dealership and they couldn’t replicate the problems and the car didn’t register any errors. So they returned it to me. This morning I drove to work and the exact same thing happened at the exact same place. Only this time I wasn’t able to get over as quickly and my car shut down in the middle of an intersection. Luckily I was able to coast to the side of the road. The dealership is still saying they can’t fix what they don’t know is wrong. Which I get, but it’s weird that these major events aren’t being recorded by the car. And it is terrifying to suddenly lose power on the freeway.

POWER TRAIN

The shifter would indicate it's in neutral but the car would think it's in drive. The car was immobilized and could not be moved when hitting the accelerator. This happened in the middle of Baltimore. I had to 'reboot' the car to get it to work, 3-4 times, while sitting in traffic. Problem has surfaced multiple times and is currently at the dealer for this issue. Was recreatable at the dealer. This was after some issue with the hybrid system on the highway where the electrical part of the drive train was inoperable and I had put it in park at a stop light to to try and see if that would fix it. I know the electrical part was inoperable because of how sluggish the car was and the car itself was saying Regen options were not available and the hybrid battery was drained to 0.

ENGINE

Temperature was 28 degrees outside. Car had 4500 miles on it. Car warmed up for 10 minutes before driving. At the one mile mark, it locked up at 31 mph and 1.4 rpm. It would not accelerate and it maintained the speed and rpm without pressing on the gas. The brakes did work. It lasted for another mile and then resolved. No indicator lights came on. The car did. It recognize there was a problem. It has not been replicated. It is available to be inspected. Not being able to accelerate above 31mph poses significant risk to both my family and other drivers.

FUEL/PROPULSION SYSTEM

Temperature was 28 degrees outside. Car had 4500 miles on it. Car warmed up for 10 minutes before driving. At the one mile mark, it locked up at 31 mph and 1.4 rpm. It would not accelerate and it maintained the speed and rpm without pressing on the gas. The brakes did work. It lasted for another mile and then resolved. No indicator lights came on. The car did. It recognize there was a problem. It has not been replicated. It is available to be inspected. Not being able to accelerate above 31mph poses significant risk to both my family and other drivers.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

I own a 2025 Kia Carnival SX Prestige Hybrid, and the vehicle intermittently fails to exceed 31 mph when the outside temperature is cold, typically in the single digits or low teens. This issue occurs when I use the remote start system and get into the car to leave for work around 6:50 to 7 am. I have not attempted to replicate this without using the remote start. I have taken the vehicle to the dealership, and they are aware of the problem. They have attempted to recreate the issue but were unable to do so. I have also provided them with a video of the situation and have multiple videos documenting the occurrence.

POWER TRAIN

I own a 2025 Kia Carnival SX Prestige Hybrid, and the vehicle intermittently fails to exceed 31 mph when the outside temperature is cold, typically in the single digits or low teens. This issue occurs when I use the remote start system and get into the car to leave for work around 6:50 to 7 am. I have not attempted to replicate this without using the remote start. I have taken the vehicle to the dealership, and they are aware of the problem. They have attempted to recreate the issue but were unable to do so. I have also provided them with a video of the situation and have multiple videos documenting the occurrence.

POWER TRAIN

When driving the vehicle it would not accelerate beyond 31 mph. We were in traffic so not being able to drive the speed limit posed a risk of other vehicles hitting us. Also when merging into highway speed traffic this was very unsafe. No warning limits or check engine lights came on and the dealer can not replicate the issue nor can they tell us why this happened.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

Car would not accelerate past 30 or 31 MPH no matter how hard gas pedal was engaged. The RPMs increase, acknowledging the gas, but the speed stays the same. Stopping the vehicle and putting in park doesn’t fix it. This is particularly dangerous when going from city street to highway or interstate driving. It eventually self-corrects after about 5 minutes. We’ve experienced multiple instances now, and all have been in cold weather (<10° F).

FUEL/PROPULSION SYSTEM

Car would not accelerate past 30 or 31 MPH no matter how hard gas pedal was engaged. The RPMs increase, acknowledging the gas, but the speed stays the same. Stopping the vehicle and putting in park doesn’t fix it. This is particularly dangerous when going from city street to highway or interstate driving. It eventually self-corrects after about 5 minutes. We’ve experienced multiple instances now, and all have been in cold weather (<10° F).

ENGINE

Car would not accelerate past 30 or 31 MPH no matter how hard gas pedal was engaged. The RPMs increase, acknowledging the gas, but the speed stays the same. Stopping the vehicle and putting in park doesn’t fix it. This is particularly dangerous when going from city street to highway or interstate driving. It eventually self-corrects after about 5 minutes. We’ve experienced multiple instances now, and all have been in cold weather (<10° F).

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

Vehicle not be able to accelerate over 31 mph, seems to happen when its cold outside. This is unsafe especially on highways. Dealership was not able to reproduce the issue. No warning lamps, messages, or other symptoms prior to the failure. The issue first appear under cold weather.

POWER TRAIN

While driving in the cold the hybrid vehicle will not go over 31 miles an hour. I was turning on to a road that is 45mph and unable to reach a safe speed with traffic. This has happened twice to me now. The dealer can not make it repeat the issue at this time and no warning lights come on.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

Turned out onto a busy city street and tried to accelerate but speed was electronically limited to 31mph. once it got to the 31mph, the car didn’t rev at all anymore. I had to pull over quickly. I drove around a parking lot a few times just to see if there was anything wrong in the settings. I couldn’t find anything. So I tried again. Same result - as soon as I pulled out and stamped on the accelerator, it revved just until 31mph and then cut out. I had to pull over immediately again and turn the car off and then back on again. After I did this, it drove as it normally does and the speed was no longer limited.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

Van accelerates up to 31mph only. Top speed is 31mph even with accelerator/gas pedal completely pressed to the ground (RPMs increase to 4K with no acceleration.) No warning or display lights illuminated. This happens in cold weather (under 20 degrees F), first trip after sitting overnight or for a longer period of time. If I pull over and shut off/restart the car, it resolves. However this has happened in stretches of road with limits 55+, little/no shoulder and approaching cars and it's a safety hazard to 1) not be able to speed up and 2) not ideal to pull over to turn off/on car especially with children in the car. Van was inspected by Kia Dealer and found no issue/was able to recreate at the auto shop so it was given back to me. First instance happened at 1,500 miles and is continuing. I do have video of this instances happening.

ENGINE

I'm not sure which component caused the issue, but this happened a couple of times already, when I stepped on the accelerator pedal, but the vehicle didn't response at all. The first time, when I was turning into a parking lot, I had to let off the gas pedal, and try it again. The second time this happened was very scary, I was trying to get on to the main road, but I was coming up from a steep hill side road, and I saw a car was coming, but I should have enough/time distance to get on the road, but after the initial acceleration, the car moved forward, but when I applied more power, but it wouldn't move at all! Luckily the oncoming car slowered down and let me go, I was on the opposite lane (incoming traffic), and luckily no car was coming my way. This is 100% safety issue!!!

POWER TRAIN

I'm not sure which component caused the issue, but this happened a couple of times already, when I stepped on the accelerator pedal, but the vehicle didn't response at all. The first time, when I was turning into a parking lot, I had to let off the gas pedal, and try it again. The second time this happened was very scary, I was trying to get on to the main road, but I was coming up from a steep hill side road, and I saw a car was coming, but I should have enough/time distance to get on the road, but after the initial acceleration, the car moved forward, but when I applied more power, but it wouldn't move at all! Luckily the oncoming car slowered down and let me go, I was on the opposite lane (incoming traffic), and luckily no car was coming my way. This is 100% safety issue!!!

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

I'm not sure which component caused the issue, but this happened a couple of times already, when I stepped on the accelerator pedal, but the vehicle didn't response at all. The first time, when I was turning into a parking lot, I had to let off the gas pedal, and try it again. The second time this happened was very scary, I was trying to get on to the main road, but I was coming up from a steep hill side road, and I saw a car was coming, but I should have enough/time distance to get on the road, but after the initial acceleration, the car moved forward, but when I applied more power, but it wouldn't move at all! Luckily the oncoming car slowered down and let me go, I was on the opposite lane (incoming traffic), and luckily no car was coming my way. This is 100% safety issue!!!

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

The acceleration didn’t want to pass 31 mph

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

My wife and I have a 2025 Carnival SX Prestige Hybrid. We live in northern Maryland (lots of cold days lately!). This exact issue has happened three times and counting. While driving, our car will randomly lose all ability to accelerate. You can press the gas pedal all the way to the floor, and it will not gain speed. It seems to happen at lower speeds, around 30mph and it just caps off and will not accelerate and lose all power. The only thing that fixes the issue is literally pulling over and restarting the car, and then it drives fine. We took it into the dealer after the second incident and they claimed that a camera was just obstructed by ice, so the car probably thought it detected something in front of us so it stopped accelerating as a safety feature. To that, I said “but if the car thought there was something in front of us, it would have applied emergency braking, not just simply stopping any acceleration”… to which they replied “yeah I don’t know. Cars these days are just a giant rolling computer”. The dealer just could not replicate the issue, so they had no way of really seeing or diagnosing it, which I understand but still frustrating. They said they drove it 3 times but it didn’t happen. But again, it happens randomly (though cold weather seems to be a common factor). So we left and said okay, they tried, they cleared off the camera, let’s see what happens. One week later (this morning) happened again. Taking into the dealer this evening. We have a Case open with the Kia Customer Care “Escalations” team. But they’ve been no help.

POWER TRAIN

My wife and I have a 2025 Carnival SX Prestige Hybrid. We live in northern Maryland (lots of cold days lately!). This exact issue has happened three times and counting. While driving, our car will randomly lose all ability to accelerate. You can press the gas pedal all the way to the floor, and it will not gain speed. It seems to happen at lower speeds, around 30mph and it just caps off and will not accelerate and lose all power. The only thing that fixes the issue is literally pulling over and restarting the car, and then it drives fine. We took it into the dealer after the second incident and they claimed that a camera was just obstructed by ice, so the car probably thought it detected something in front of us so it stopped accelerating as a safety feature. To that, I said “but if the car thought there was something in front of us, it would have applied emergency braking, not just simply stopping any acceleration”… to which they replied “yeah I don’t know. Cars these days are just a giant rolling computer”. The dealer just could not replicate the issue, so they had no way of really seeing or diagnosing it, which I understand but still frustrating. They said they drove it 3 times but it didn’t happen. But again, it happens randomly (though cold weather seems to be a common factor). So we left and said okay, they tried, they cleared off the camera, let’s see what happens. One week later (this morning) happened again. Taking into the dealer this evening. We have a Case open with the Kia Customer Care “Escalations” team. But they’ve been no help.

ENGINE

My wife and I have a 2025 Carnival SX Prestige Hybrid. We live in northern Maryland (lots of cold days lately!). This exact issue has happened three times and counting. While driving, our car will randomly lose all ability to accelerate. You can press the gas pedal all the way to the floor, and it will not gain speed. It seems to happen at lower speeds, around 30mph and it just caps off and will not accelerate and lose all power. The only thing that fixes the issue is literally pulling over and restarting the car, and then it drives fine. We took it into the dealer after the second incident and they claimed that a camera was just obstructed by ice, so the car probably thought it detected something in front of us so it stopped accelerating as a safety feature. To that, I said “but if the car thought there was something in front of us, it would have applied emergency braking, not just simply stopping any acceleration”… to which they replied “yeah I don’t know. Cars these days are just a giant rolling computer”. The dealer just could not replicate the issue, so they had no way of really seeing or diagnosing it, which I understand but still frustrating. They said they drove it 3 times but it didn’t happen. But again, it happens randomly (though cold weather seems to be a common factor). So we left and said okay, they tried, they cleared off the camera, let’s see what happens. One week later (this morning) happened again. Taking into the dealer this evening. We have a Case open with the Kia Customer Care “Escalations” team. But they’ve been no help.

ENGINE

On a day which had a high temperature of 16F our Kia Carnival Hybrid SXP, after not being used most of the day, when driving would not exceed 31 miles per hour. The engine would not rev loudly or give any indication of an error but would not go over 31 mph even with the gas pedal fully depressed. After pulling over and turning the car off and on the problem did not repeat.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

On a day which had a high temperature of 16F our Kia Carnival Hybrid SXP, after not being used most of the day, when driving would not exceed 31 miles per hour. The engine would not rev loudly or give any indication of an error but would not go over 31 mph even with the gas pedal fully depressed. After pulling over and turning the car off and on the problem did not repeat.

VEHICLE SPEED CONTROL

Today I had an issue with my 2025 Kia Carnival Hybrid SX Prestige where it would not allow me to accelerate past 31 mph. I was on an on-ramp to the highway with my baby in the car and I was flooring the gas, yet it still would not go past 31 mph. I put on my hazards and pulled off, and checked that the max speed setting was not on. I even tried setting the max speed to something higher like 50 mph, and the screen confirmed this, but the car still did not go past 31 mph. Luckily I figured out that cruise control still works past this speed limit, but it was super dangerous getting onto the highway going 25 mph slower than everyone else. When I eventually got to a red light I turned the car off and on and that seemed to solve it, as I was able to go past 31 mph. Later that day on a different drive, this exact issue happened again where I could not accelerate past 31 mph. I am taking my car to Kia in a few days to get it checked out. There was no warning messages and the screen's max speed did not match with what the car was actually doing.

UNKNOWN OR OTHER

The following has happened 4-5 times now on our Kia Carnival 2025 SXP Hybrid: After turning on the car, the car can be driven but does not allow the driver to increase the speed beyond ~30 miles per hour. No warning indicators or messages are displayed when this occurs. Turning the vehicle off and then on again temporarily resolves the issue. One of the times it occurred, I went straight from a 25 mph city street onto a highway onramp that didn't have a safe place to pull off. When I got on the onramp, I discovered that the issue was happening as I was unable to accelerate beyond 30mph. The highway had a speed limit of 65mph and a minimum speed limit of 55mph. Joining the highway at 30mph was both illegal and unsafe and could have absolutely caused a fatal crash. ---- To troubleshoot this issue, we took it into the dealership and they didn't find any errors recorded or anything abnormal in diagnostics. They told us it was probably just a malfunctioning of the "Auto Highway Speed Change" setting that is intended to slow you down around curves when using cruise control on the highway. We told them that didn't make sense because it happened to us on city streets where that setting isn't even in play, but they insisted it was still the culprit and didn't investigate further. It happened again to us today with AHSC disabled, so clearly the AHSC setting doesn't explain things(and would be an issue that needs fixing even if it did).

UNKNOWN OR OTHER

I was driving on a secondary road that has a 45 MPH speed limit when the vehicle decelerated to 31 MPH on its own. I could not make it go faster with any application of the accelerator. This lasted for about 5 minutes. I called the dealer service and they said it was probably a "glitch" and they could not investigate unless I left the vehicle with them until they could reproduce it. One unusual fact is that it was very cold the morning it happened, 9 degrees fahrenheit. I believe this could be very dangerous, particularly if hit happens on a highway. I spoke to another owner on Reddit who had the same thing happen twice.