SsangYong’s refreshed Rexton is due in Australia in October 2023, boasting an overhauled interior.
The Rexton appeared in government approval documents this week, listing both five- and seven-seat options.
Currently, the Rexton is available only with seven seats in Australia. Sometimes carmakers will have a variant approved for sale even if they don’t intend to offer it right away.
Even if a five-seat Rexton doesn’t arrive in October, CarExpert understands the range could gain a mid-spec variant to slot between the base ELX and flagship Ultimate.
SsangYong Australia has confirmed the large SUV’s powertrain will carry over unchanged. It’s a 2.2-litre turbo-diesel four-cylinder engine producing 150kW of power and 441Nm of torque, mated to an eight-speed automatic transmission and a part-time four-wheel drive system.
Inside, the updated Rexton has a larger 12.3-inch touchscreen infotainment system jutting out of the dashboard. Being considerably larger than the outgoing model’s 8.0-inch unit, it has necessitated a redesign of the dashboard.
The air vents are now horizontally oriented and “hidden” within a trim element stretching across much of the dashboard. You can adjust the climate control settings via new touch-capacitive switchgear.
A 12.3-inch digital instrument cluster remains, and other elements like the shifter are unchanged.
Four different interior finishes will be offered in Korea.
In addition to a standard black interior, there’s one that pairs a black dashboard with red seats, one with tan seats and a two-tone tan and brown dashboard, and one with a khaki-coloured dashboard and seats.
There are USB-C outlets, replacing the old USB-A ones. A surround-view camera is also available.
Externally, the “diamond-shaped” grille flanked by full-LED four-beam projector headlights with welcome/goodbye animations and dynamic indicators.
The Rexton also features new wheel designs.
The list of active safety and driver assist features includes adaptive cruise control, lane-centring, lane-keep assist, autonomous emergency braking, leading vehicle departure alert, driver attention monitoring, and automatic high-beam.
The current Rexton isn’t available with adaptive cruise control, lane-keep assist or lane centring in Australia, instead offering only a simple lane-departure warning function. It’s unclear if these will be introduced.
SsangYong sold 1467 Rextons in Australia last year. While that saw it outsold by the D90 from fellow challenger brand LDV, which recorded 3183 sales, it was up 97.7 per cent year over year.
That was the second largest improvement in the large SUV segment, behind only the D90 at 102 per cent.
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