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The Hyundai Veloster N is getting a dual-clutch automatic transmission

Hyundai's little hot hatch is getting a new pair of performance seats, too.

Steven Ewing Former managing editor
Steven Ewing spent his childhood reading car magazines, making his career as an automotive journalist an absolute dream job. After getting his foot in the door at Automobile while he was still a teenager, Ewing found homes on the mastheads at Winding Road magazine, Autoblog and Motor1.com before joining the CNET team in 2018. He has also served on the World Car Awards jury. Ewing grew up ingrained in the car culture of Detroit -- the Motor City -- before eventually moving to Los Angeles. In his free time, Ewing loves to cook, binge trash TV and play the drums.
Steven Ewing
2 min read
2019 Hyundai Veloster N
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2019 Hyundai Veloster N

The Hyundai Veloster N is one of the best performance values around.

Manuel Carrillo III/Roadshow

The is a real firecracker, and one of our favorite affordable performance cars. But while the Veloster N is exclusively available with a six-speed manual transmission right now (which we love), it appears will soon broaden its hot hatch's accessibility with a dual-clutch automatic option.

Hyundai confirmed the Veloster N's new DCT on its Instagram account on Monday, with an accompanying video that not only shows the gear lever on the center console, but paddle shifters mounted to the steering wheel.

There's another surprise in this video, too. Blink and you'll miss our first look at the Veloster N's new performance seats, complete with a light-up logo in the backrest. Other sites have spied these seats, too, and good news, they appear to be heated. That's a big deal, since the lack of heated seats is one of our only gripes about the Veloster N in its current form.

It's unclear exactly when these updates will be available to customers. The 2020 model-year Veloster N is currently on sale, but Hyundai's build-and-price site does not list the dual-clutch transmission or performance seats as options. A Hyundai spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment.

We also don't know if the DCT option will be available with the Veloster N's performance pack. In its standard form, the Veloster N's 2.0-liter turbo engine produces 250 horsepower and 260 pound-feet of torque, but with the performance pack, the horsepower number increases to 275. It's also unclear if the DCT will result in improvements to the Veloster N's 0-to-60-mph time of roughly 6 seconds.

Given Hyundai is already taking to social media to confirm these updates, we expect the Veloster N's new bits to be available in the coming months.

2019 Hyundai Veloster N is right-priced performance

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