If you’ve got a high-end sedan, a luxury coupe, or a crossover and you want the versatility of an all-season tire along with refined ride quality and low highway noise, Grand Touring tires are the way to go. All-season tires are designed for great wear properties, year-round traction in dry, wet, or light wintry conditions, capable handling, composed road manners, and low noise, and Grand Touring tires are designed to check all those boxes as well as delivering enhanced ride quality and a cathedral-quiet ride on the highway. Hankook’s Kinergy XP H446 is a great example of what a Grand Touring tire should be; Hankook designed it for the weight, power, torque, center of gravity, and handling properties of compact, midsize, and large SUVs and crossovers as well as sedans. The Kinergy XP H446 is packed with features that are designed for the everyday needs of drivers, with a great balance of performance, ride quality, and all-around traction in all-season and all-weather conditions. The Kinergy XP H446 joins the Kinergy ST, Kinergy PT, and Kinergy 4S2 in the Hankook lineup. But don’t just take us at our word on this – let’s go in and get a closer look with this Hankook Kinergy XP H446 tire review:

Features and Benefits

Here are some of the innovations and design features that make the Hankook Kinergy XP H446 a great candidate for an aftermarket Grand Touring tire for sedans and SUVs:

• Advanced silica-rich tread formulation delivers long wear and improvements of 6 percent in wet-weather handling and 2 percent in braking (compared to its predecessor)
• Increased sipe density yields a 15 percent improvement in acceleration and 14 percent improvement in braking on snowy roads (compared to its predecessor)
• Noise reduction technology includes expanded shoulder grooves, optimized multi-pitch tread pattern, and knurled grooves for a 5 percent reduction in highway noise (compared to its predecessor)
• Corvex Tread Radius Technology employs highly flexible materials for an enhanced contact patch and improved wear properties, with 20 percent longer tread life (compared to its predecessor)
• Continuous center rib gives the Hankook great straight-line stability and nimble steering response
• Covered from the factory with a 75,000 mile limited manufacturer’s tread life warranty
• Chances of hydroplaning on wet pavement are reduced thanks to a system of wide circumferential and lateral grooves that efficiently route water away from the tire’s contact patch
• Beveled edges in shoulder grooves give the Kinergy XP H446 enhanced grip on wet or snowy pavement

Pros and Cons

In the case of the Hankook Kinergy XP H446, this is a tire where the Pros definitely outweigh the Cons:

PROS:

• Ride is very comfortable and very quiet
• Best-in-class limited manufacturer’s tread life warranty coverage
• Dependable grip on wet or dry pavement
• Marked improvement over predecessor tires from Hankook

CONS:

• Not good in heavier snow or slush
• Handling is predictable and responsive, but not as nimble as a performance tire

SimpleTire’s view on Hankook Kinergy XP H446 tires

Are you familiar with SimpleScore? SimpleScore is the system that the SimpleTire team developed to give you a quick at-a-glance idea of any tire’s strengths and weaknesses. We look at the tire’s specs, information from the manufacturer, customer reviews, and other data points, then process that to a 1-10 numerical value for the categories of traction, handling, longevity, and an overall average SimpleScore. For the Hankook Kinergy XP H446, the SimpleScore ratings look like this:

Hankook Kinergy XP H446

• Traction: 8.4
• Handling: 8.6
• Longevity: 7.7
• Overall average SimpleScore: 8.2

Obviously for any 1-10 rating system, those are a pretty solid and respectable set of scores.

Traction with the Hankook is confident and consistent on wet or dry pavement, thanks to its advanced tread compound and its system of grooves and sipes, the hair-thin slits that multiply a tire’s tread surface area and traction. Those 3D sipes also give the Hankook a boost when it comes to winter conditions as they slice through snow and slush, although admittedly a tire like the Kinergy XP H446 typically doesn’t perform well in deeper snow.

On the highway, the Hankook’s road manners are impeccable, with dead-on straight-line tracking at highway speed along with driver feedback that never feels numb or sluggish. Steering response is light and precise, and cornering ability is neutral and predictable, with few vices evident. The Hankook Kinergy XP H446’s handling properties and cornering might not be up to the expectations you might have for an ultra-high-performance tire, but it’s very capable even when pushed hard.

A 75,000 mile limited manufacturer’s tread life warranty is outstanding for any tire, and the tread features, enhanced contact patch, and long-wearing silica-enhanced tread compound of the Kinergy XP H446 give it outstanding wear properties. Its ride quality and hushed noise levels make the Kinergy XP H446 the perfect complement for a wide range of luxury and high-end vehicles, where any excessive noise would be pretty intrusive, and it’s available in a wide range of sizes for a variety of fitments. All in all, it’s our take here at the SimpleTire team that the Hankook Kinergy XP H446 is a great choice as a replacement tire for a plethora of sedans, crossovers, and SUVs.

Vehicles the Hankook Kinergy XP H446 is a good replacement tire for

While the Hankook Kinergy XP H446 isn’t featured as OEM on any makes and models, it would make a great aftermarket replacement tire for vehicles such as:

• Dodge Challenger
• Dodge Charger
• Honda Passport
• Kia Carnival
• Audi A5
• Alfa Romeo Giulia
• BMW M2
• Ford Mustang
• Ford Mach-E
• Ford Escape
• Kia Stinger
• Kia K5
• Jaguar XF
• Lexus RC
• Subaru WRX
• Porsche Taycan
• Honda Civic
• Honda Accord
• Honda HR-V
• Cadillac CT5
• Mercedes-Benz C-Class
• Volkswagen Jetta GLI
• Acura TLX
• Mazda3
• Hyundai Palisade
• Genesis GV70
• Hyundai Kona
• MINI Countryman
• Kia Niro
• Toyota RAV4
• Mazda CX-9
• Mazda CX-5
• Toyota HR-V
• Honda Pilot
• Chevrolet Traverse
• Kia Soul
• Porsche Cayenne