For enhanced safety, the front and rear seat shoulder belts of the Genesis G90 have pretensioners to tighten the seatbelts and eliminate dangerous slack in the event of a collision and force limiters to limit the pressure the belts will exert on the passengers. The BMW 8 Series Gran Coupe doesn’t offer pretensioners for its rear seat belts.
For enhanced safety, the front seat shoulder belts of the Genesis G90 are height-adjustable to accommodate a wide variety of driver and passenger heights. A better fit can prevent injuries and the increased comfort also encourages passengers to buckle up. The BMW 8 Series Gran Coupe doesn’t offer height-adjustable seat belts.
Both the G90 and 8 Series Gran Coupe have child safety locks to prevent children from opening the rear doors. The G90 has power child safety locks, allowing the driver to activate and deactivate them from the driver's seat and to know when they're engaged. The 8 Series Gran Coupe’s child locks have to be individually engaged at each rear door with a manual switch. The driver can’t know the status of the locks without opening the doors and checking them.
In the past twenty years hundreds of infants and young children have died after being left in vehicles, usually by accident. When turning the vehicle off, drivers of the G90 are reminded to check the back seat when a sensor determines the back seat is occupied. The 8 Series Gran Coupe doesn’t offer a back seat reminder.
The G90 has a standard front seat center airbag, which deploys between the driver and front passenger, protecting them from injuries caused by striking each other in serious side impacts. The 8 Series Gran Coupe doesn’t offer front seat center airbags.
The G90 has standard Anti-Whiplash Front Head Restraints, which use a specially designed headrest to protect the driver and front passenger from whiplash. During a rear-end collision, the Anti-Whiplash Front Head Restraints system moves the headrests forward to prevent neck and spine injuries. The 8 Series Gran Coupe doesn’t offer a whiplash protection system.
Over 200 people are killed each year when backed over by motor vehicles. The G90 has a standard Parking Collision-Avoidance Assist-Reverse that uses rear sensors to monitor for objects to the rear and automatically applies the brakes to prevent a collision. The 8 Series Gran Coupe doesn’t offer backup collision prevention brakes.
To provide maximum traction and stability on all roads, All-Wheel Drive is standard on the G90. But it costs extra on the 8 Series Gran Coupe.
The G90 has a standard blind spot warning system that uses sensors to alert the driver to objects in the vehicle’s blind spots where the side view mirrors don’t reveal them and moves the vehicle back into its lane. A system to reveal vehicles in the 8 Series Gran Coupe’s blind spot costs extra.
To help make backing out of a parking space safer, the G90 has standard Rear Cross-Traffic Collision-Avoidance Assist and automatically engage the brakes. BMW charges extra for Cross Traffic Warning on the 8 Series Gran Coupe and the 8 Series Gran Coupe’s Cross Traffic Warning does not include automatic braking.
Both the G90 and the 8 Series Gran Coupe have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front side-impact airbags, driver knee airbags, side-impact head airbags, four-wheel antilock brakes, traction control, electronic stability systems to prevent skidding, crash mitigating brakes, daytime running lights, lane departure warning systems, rearview cameras and driver alert monitors.
The Genesis G90 has achieved the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s (IIHS) highest rating of “Top Safety Pick Plus” for the 2024 model year. This distinction is based on its exceptional performance in IIHS’ rigorous battery of safety tests. Specifically, it earned an “Acceptable” rating in the latest, more stringent moderate overlap front crash test, a “Good” result in the updated side impact test, and a “Good” score in the revised pedestrian crash prevention test. The 8 Series Gran Coupe has not yet been evaluated by the IIHS for 2024.