2021 Kia Seltos Inside and Out

To understand the 2021 Kia Seltos, you first have to consider its soul, the Kia Soul.

Between the fun-and-funky styling and the compact, practical body style with tons of cargo room, the car that has defied traditional segment labels for a decade (and won an Autoblog comparison test) is a great all-around daily driver for folks who don’t want something that's obviously a crossover.

There’s just one problem: A lot of people really, really want crossovers.With this in mind, Kia decided to see if the Soul could be made more like one of them.

Now, the simplest way to do that could've just been to introduce an all-wheel-drive Soul derivative, but somewhere along the line, the Korean automaker’s product planners decided that would've been a half measure.

They considered the fast-growing small crossover segment too hyper-competitive to simply trot out some half-assed Soul "Cross Country" model.

Well, besides the X-Line.Instead, the 2021 Kia Seltos was born, a completely different vehicle in its own right, yet one that wears its soul on its sleeve by packing subtle hints to that trademark styling and some of its interior options.If offering all-wheel drive as standard helps cement its identity as a crossover, then the fact its all-wheel drive system comes with a locking center coupling truly seals the deal.