THE GREENEST car you can buy in the UK right now is the Hyundai Ioniq, according to a panel of independent judges.

The new Ioniq Electric has been named as the Green Car of the Year 2016 by leading environmental motoring website Next Green Car and the judges also awarded the Ioniq with the top spot in the Small Family car category, ahead of the Renault Megane, Fiat Tipo and Volvo V40.

Judges praised the Ioniq's capabilities as an all-round family car, as well as its recognised eco credentials as a zero emission electric vehicle, saying: "It's tough to find any weaknesses with the Hyundai Ioniq Electric. Plenty of range-stretching features help make the Ioniq Electric an easy EV to drive over long distances, while the company has also packed in plenty of performance, practicality, and value for money into the package."

The Ioniq Electric went on sale at the end of October together with the Ioniq Hybrid and since then almost 300 cars have been delivered. Both models will be joined by a Plug-in variant in the second quarter of next year.

Next Green Car's judges handed out awards across 10 motoring categories, made up of nine vehicle sectors, and a Next Generation award.

Cars launched this year or due to be launched in 2017 were judged against a range of environmental, performance and cost criteria. With key environmental credentials established, other considerations such as suitability for purpose, impact on the market, and value for money were taken into account, to decide the winning vehicles in each category.

Commenting on the winners of this year's awards, Dr Ben Lane, Director at Next Green Car, said: "We are delighted to give recognition to 10 cars which best combine environmental and driving performance. Utilising state-of-the-art technology, the winners demonstrate that cars can be exhilarating to drive and impact less on the environment - all at affordable cost.

"To illustrate the range and capability of low emission vehicles now on the market, the average CO emissions of the finalists across the 10 categories is less than 36 g/km, nine of the 20 models are pure-electric, six are plug-in hybrids, four conventional hybrids, with only one model not featuring any kind of electrification; reflecting the global trend in auto-tech."

Other category winners were: Citycar - Volkswagen e-up!; Supermini - Renault Zoe Z.E. 40; Large Family car - Kia Optima Plug-In Hybrid; MPV - BMW 225xe; Crossover Toyota C-HR; SUV - Tesla Model X; Executive - BMW 330e; Sports Cabrio - Morgan EV3; Next Generation Award - Riversimple Rasa.