The Hyundai’s new Venue SUV has received a Top Safety Pick award from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS).

To qualify for a 2020 Top Safety Pick award, a vehicle must earn good ratings in six crashworthiness evaluations, including the driver-side small overlap front, passenger-side small overlap front, moderate overlap front, side, roof strength and head restraint tests, according to the IIHS. 

It also needs advanced or superior ratings for both vehicle-to-vehicle and vehicle-to-pedestrian front crash prevention, as well as an acceptable or good headlight rating.

The Venue has standard and optional front crash prevention systems that meet the award criteria. Both earn superior ratings for vehicle-to-vehicle crash prevention. With either system, the Venue avoided collisions in vehicle-to-vehicle tests at 12 and 25 mph. 

In the vehicle-to-pedestrian evaluation, the standard system earns an advanced rating, while the optional system rates superior. Both systems avoided or substantially mitigated the severity of collisions in all pedestrian scenarios, although the optional system avoided impacts in more scenarios and averaged greater speed reductions.

The Venue is available with two headlight options, both of which include high-beam assist. The LED projector headlights available on more expensive trim levels earn an acceptable rating. The base headlights — halogen projectors — rate marginal due to inadequate illumination on curves.

The marginal headlight rating prevents the Venue from qualifying for the higher-tier Top Safety Pick+ award, which goes to models that come with good- or acceptable-rated headlights across all trim levels in addition to meeting the other Top Safety Pick criteria.

The Venue is classified as a small SUV because it is built on the same platform as another small SUV, the Hyundai Kona. However, the Venue is considerably lighter and smaller than the Kona and weighs less than many small cars.