The Genesis G70 has been a darling for the enthusiast community since it first went on sale back in 2019 with its good looks and BMW 3 Series-fighting driving dynamics, but it looks like its time here on Earth may be coming to an end. Genesis has now been on its own for about 10 years, and the Korean automaker is at a bit of a crossroads. Does it go upmarket, or does it stay as a value proposition compared to its German competitors?
Well, the car most central to these discussions is the G70. With its $43,850 (including destination) starting price, the G70 is by far the cheapest vehicle Genesis offers. The automaker’s global production officer, Marc Choi, spoke with Car and Driver about the internal and external factors that could ultimately decide the G70’s fate. Here’s what he had to say:
“It’s very attractive to think, okay, let’s do a front-wheel drive, $45,000 or below model, but we want to avoid making that hasty decision,” said Choi. “Our goal for the brand is to pull up the brand equity, so we’re resisting at the moment. So even within our lineup, we want to focus on some of the larger products like G80, GV80, and G90 series where we can make more product and equity for the brand.”
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“We always consider [the low end of our range], and we want to create potentially a next-generation G70 with a little bit more affordable price range, but we need to compete within our sister brands as well, so there needs to be a kind of balance.”
Moving up in the world
It has already started going upmarket in places like the Middle East. There, Genesis has thrown itself into the world of ultra-luxury vehicles with its one-of-one program for extremely wealthy customers. The rest of the world hasn’t quite seen that sort of leap, but we have gotten pretty sizable facelifts to the G80 and GV80, and there’s a coupe version of the GV80 coming in the very near future.
The automaker is also planning to debut “Prestige Black” versions of the G80, G90, GV80 and GV80 Coupe in the U.S. by the end of this year. Genesis has also revealed a pair of concept vehicles based on the G90 sedan — which look absolutely fantastic. There’s no word on if these vehicles will actually make it into production, but it sure would be cool if they did. To be honest, if this push upmarket is to be believed, it would make a hell of a lot of sense for Genesis to actually make these vehicles.
Lagging sales
Unfortunately, moves like these will probably come at the expense of vehicles like the G70. I know some folks will bemoan this, but it’s not like the G70 has been selling particularly well anyway. The company sold 12,258 G70s in 2024 (and a little under 2,000 through this point in 2025), according to Good Car Bad Car. If you compare that to the 35,590 C-Classes Mercedes-Benz sold in 2024 and the 31,330 3-Series sedans BMW sold at the same time, you can tell the G70 was falling pretty far behind the competition even though it’s far cheaper than either of those two offerings.
This isn’t the first time we’ve reported the G70 may be getting the axe, and I’m going to hazard a guess that it won’t be the last time. People don’t want sedans — and they really don’t want small ones. Add that to the fact Genesis is trying to reinvent itself, and it’s not a recipe for success.
