GV90 Front Seats Spin Around to Face the Back Row

The 2028 Genesis GV90 has no start button, its front seats rotate 180 degrees to face the second row, and its center screen rises out of the dash to become a 24.6-inch television when parked.

Those three features sit at the center of how Genesis wants its first full-size flagship SUV to feel, and the brand is now explaining in detail how each one works ahead of the GV90’s arrival in the US. The swivel seats, a first for Hyundai Motor Group, turn at the press of a button on the door trim and let four occupants sit face to face for a conversation or a meeting while the car is stopped. Every seat reclines deeply, deploys a power leg rest and carries a massage system with 15 air cells and a pulse-vibration function.

Genesis laid out the cabin in a deep dive on the GV90’s interior published October 21, the first of three technical releases on the SUV. The start-up sequence is the part most likely to surprise a first-time passenger. When the driver pulls the handle to close the door, the car powers on and the door closes itself. The Motion Column Shifter then moves from the 12 o’clock to the 2 o’clock position, the Crystal Sphere Controller rotates to reveal its controls and the tweeter covers on the dashboard slide apart. From there, pressing the brake pedal puts the car in Drive.

The display is the other headline feature. While driving, the 23.6-inch OLED screen combines the instrument cluster, navigation and media. Parked, a button on the center fascia raises it by 90 millimeters to a 24.6-inch panel with roughly 1.7 times the viewing area, a 3840 by 1440 resolution and a Media Home mode for streaming apps and live channels, much like a smart TV. In an earlier release on the screen’s development, Genesis engineer Jongkyo Ahn said the pop-up mechanism was mounted directly to the cowl crossbar to keep it from vibrating, that it survived more than 100,000 test cycles and that its operating noise stayed below 40 decibels, which he compared to a library. The screen retracts automatically once the car starts to move so it cannot interfere with the passenger airbag.

The software behind it is Pleos Connect, Hyundai Motor Group’s Android Automotive-based infotainment platform, which the GV90 is the first Genesis to carry. It pairs with a 25-inch head-up display that replaces a conventional gauge cluster and with Gleo AI, a large language model agent that takes natural-language requests for climate, entertainment and settings and learns an occupant’s preferences over time. The GV90 adds menu bars on both sides of the screen so the driver and front passenger each get their own climate and shortcut controls.

The rest of the cabin is built around warmth and privacy. A real wood veneer floor in the second row hides a radiant heating system inspired by Korean ondol underfloor heating, and radiant warmers are also built into the console armrests, side panels and door trims in both rows. There is a built-in refrigerator, heated cup holders, fold-away tables in the second row and illuminated vanity mirrors in the front passenger visor and the backs of the front headrests. The four-seat GV90 Neolun Executive Suite adds a Comfort Partition that walls off the cargo area from the second row, powered rear roll blinds and a Smart Vision Roof whose glass can be dimmed independently across six zones.

Sound comes from a 25-speaker Bang & Olufsen Premier 3D system with a 7.1.4-channel Dolby Atmos layout, Acoustic Lens tweeters at each end of the dash and four headliner speakers. Its Virtual Venue mode recreates the acoustics of halls such as Boston Symphony Hall and Wembley Stadium. Genesis has not announced US pricing or an on-sale date for the GV90, which it unveiled in San Francisco on August 19 with a 123.5-kilowatt-hour battery, 657 horsepower and an estimated 310 miles of range for the seven-seat version.

The HyundaiHQ Take

Most of what Genesis describes here would read as showroom theater on a lesser car, but the pieces fit together into a single idea: the GV90 is meant to be used while it is parked as much as while it is moving. That is a smart bet for a six-figure electric SUV, because a big battery can run a cabin for hours, and nobody else in the segment is offering a wood floor with underfloor heat and seats that turn around. The open question is whether buyers who have never considered a Korean luxury brand will pay Range Rover money for it, and the answer will depend on the pricing Genesis has yet to announce.