Kia Lease Deals September 2026: Every Model Ranked

Kia changed 74 trims this month and 54 of those changes are worth nothing. Lease cash went up across most of the lineup, by as much as $2,000 on the EV9, and Kia took it straight back out of the residual. The payments land within a dollar of August.

The EV9 Light Long Range is the clearest case. Lease cash went from $14,780 to $16,780 while the residual fell from 53% to 49%. Payment: ~$542 in August, ~$541 now. The genuine improvements are the ones Kia did not advertise, in the 2027 Carnival and Sportage Hybrid, where residuals went up a point and payments fell $9 to $12. The Telluride, the EV3 and the K4 Hatchback did not move at all.

The Lineup, Cheapest First

The K4 LXS at ~$295 is the cheapest Kia lease and the Telluride Hybrid X-Line SX Prestige at ~$765 is the most expensive of the trims shown. Kia prices 146 leaseable trims this month, so this is a selection: the cheapest and the most expensive of each model year, plus every trim whose payment actually changed.

Unlike most brands right now, Kia puts real cash on almost everything. It runs from $630 on a Carnival LX to $16,950 on an EV9 Wind AWD. What the next section explains is why that number moved so much and your payment did not.

What These Payments Actually Are

Every payment above is calculated at full MSRP, nothing down, before tax. No dealer discount, no trade, no fees. They are a ceiling, not a target. Nobody should pay these numbers and plenty of people will pay less.

Use them as a measuring stick. Put your dealer's quote next to the row here and the gap tells you how much discount and how much markup are in the deal. A quote above this number on the same term and mileage means something was added that the program does not require.

Three things move a real quote away from this baseline. A discount pulls it down, and that is the only one that saves you money. Money down pulls it down too, but you already paid it, so the payment looks better while the total does not change. Tax and fees push it up, by $0 to well over $100 a month depending on your state. A New Jersey lease and a Texas lease on the same Sportage are not the same payment.

The $2,000 That Is Not There

Kia raised lease cash on 58 trims and cut the residual on 64. On 50 trims it did both at once, and the two cancel almost to the dollar. The cash is real, it reaches your cap cost, and it buys you nothing, because the car is now worth less at the end of the lease by about the same amount.

The EVs are the extreme. The EV9 Light Long Range went from $14,780 to $16,780 in cash and from 53% to 49% residual, moving the payment from ~$542 to ~$541. The EV6 Wind AWD went from $7,600 to $9,400 in cash and from 55% to 51% residual, and stayed at ~$578. Four residual points on the $59,545 EV9 is worth more than the $2,000 Kia handed back.

This matters because the cash is the number that gets advertised and the residual is the number that does not. A $16,950 lease credit on an EV9 reads like the deal of the year. It is the same lease it was in August.

The 20 Trims That Actually Moved

Twenty trims changed the payment by a dollar or more, and sixteen of them are the 2027 Carnival and 2027 Sportage Hybrid. In both cases the residual went up a point, which is the opposite of what Kia did everywhere else.

The Sportage Hybrid EX AWD goes from ~$427 to ~$415 and the EX FWD from ~$407 to ~$395, both on a residual moving 68% to 69% plus a small rate cut. The Carnival LX goes from ~$498 to ~$488 and the Carnival Hybrid SX Prestige from ~$744 to ~$732. These are the only places in the Kia lineup where waiting for September paid.

Telluride, EV3 and K4 Hatchback: Untouched

Three model lines carry their August program with no change at all. The 2027 Telluride is the notable one, because it is the newest thing Kia sells and it holds some of the highest residuals in the lineup, with the S AWD at 72%. The EV3 is Kia's new small electric SUV and arrives with the program it launched on.

The rest of the lineup that did not move is the large middle: most of the 2026 Sportage, Sorento, Seltos, K5 and Niro. If you were quoted any of those in August, that quote is still the September deal.

The Flattest Rate Sheet in the Business

Every one of the 146 priced Kia trims sits between 0.00224 and 0.00247, or 5.38% to 5.93% APR. That is the entire spread, from the $24,635 K4 to the $65,545 EV9. Kia does not use the rate to sell cars. It uses cash.

For you that is simple and useful. There is no subsidized rate to hunt for and no wall rate to avoid, so any Kia quoted outside that band is carrying dealer markup. Ask for the money factor in writing and check it against the band, then spend your effort on the selling price and on confirming the lease cash reached your cap cost.

Kia Returned Only Three Terms

The September pull returned 24, 36 and 48 months and nothing else. No 39, no 42, no 27 or 30. Where other captives give you eight or nine rungs to pick from, Kia gives you three, so the 36-month lease is the default by elimination.

Going to 48 months is expensive. Across all 146 priced trims the residual drops a median 11 points from 36 to 48 months, and up to 14 on some. The K4 LXS falls from 61% to 48%. The EV9 Light Long Range falls from 49% to 38%. Two extra years of payments against a residual that gave up more than a tenth of the car is not a trade worth making.

Payment Math & Assumptions

All monthly payments in this post are pre-tax estimates based on a 36-month term, 12,000 miles per year, and the Northeast region program. Cap cost = MSRP minus the non-conditional lease cash only. No down payment, no dealer discount, no trade. Residual is applied to MSRP per the program sheet. Conditional money such as loyalty, military and competitive conquest is excluded because not everyone qualifies.

MSRP is Kia's base MSRP plus that model year's destination charge, which Kia varies by model: $1,245 on the 2026 K4 and K5, $1,495 on most of the lineup, $1,545 on the Carnival, EV6 and Telluride, and $1,645 on the EV9. Six trims in the table show a dash rather than a month-over-month figure because the August data did not cover them.

Tax, registration, title, acquisition and dealer doc fees are excluded and vary by state. Rates and residuals are region-specific, so a Northeast number is not a California number.