2014 Kia Forte EX Long-Term Road Test

Edmunds.com

2014 Kia Forte EX Long-Term Road Test

The 2014 Kia Forte has been fully redesigned. I haven't driven it enough to make a final ruling, but the name got me thinking.

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tornado542_

Mr. Edmunds,

Im trying really hard to not be nit picky...but this is the 3rd blog entry on the Kia Forte that talks NOTHING about the car at all. (The first 2 were Vegas trip entry 2 and 3.) Is it just a slow news day? I find it hard how you can not even mention something tiny about the car...(Automatic shifter action, sun visors, glove box, etc). I think these posts are kinda meaningless considering this is a car blog.

bc1960

Mazda is a serial offender. Before going to a numeric and alphanumeric lineup they spelled 'Millenia' with one n instead of two, and 'Protegé' with an aigu accent over the second e but not the first--it should be neither for common English, or both to preserve the French spelling.

misterfusion

I don't mind the tangent, this stuff is fascinating to me. For the record, Kia has always used the "for-tay" pronunciation in their marketing. But why denigrate that pronunciation as "phony French"? Wouldn't it be more accurate to describe it as "Italian"? The definition is a separate issue.

@bc1960 - "Millenia" confused the hell out of me too at first, until I realized that Mazda was trying to make a cute & clever reference to the Miller-cycle engine in that car. I think they should've just stuck to proper spelling. :P

stovt001_

Rather appropriate, coming from the sister company to the brand that had an entire commercial devoted to explaining the pronunciation of the brand's name.

prndlol

When the original Forte arrived for 2010 there were a series of comical commercials here in Canada with the theme "so and so...not my Forte...but THAT is!" showing the car, and the actor in each ad said FortAY.

I don't think it gets more official than that.

greenpony

"Millenia" could easily have been "Milleria" to pay homage to the Miller-cycle motor. Which do YOU prefer?

zimtheinvader

Maybe they are all using the music term. -- Or do these all fall into the category of "names" rather than just words. I couldn't find anything official on it but it has always appeared that with names they don't tend to follow the general rules for pronunciation. You know, the way people like to make up new names and then explain to you how they are pronounced. --- and then there's the bing dictionary version "for·te [ fawrt ]" -- Who Fawrted? I'm gonna go ship my pants.

eclogite

Thanks for teaching me something on Friday afternoon.

tornado542_

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tempesting_

Here is my tip; ask a Korean.

Native Koreans would pronounce it "PO R TE" like 3 syllables.

wheelmccoy_

And what about the Smart Fortwo? Isn't it pronounced Fort-woe?

darthbimmer

@tornado542: I'll provide some actual car content for you. I rented a Kia Forte last week. I only had it a short time but I spent exactly zero seconds of that time worrying about the pronunciation of the name. Instead I found myself pleasantly surprised a

dg0472

Kia made it quite clear in the press releases for the original car that the name comes from the Italian musical term. Rondo and Cadenza are also musical terms, so NO, Hyundai hasn't laid claim to musical terms.