[ClarkKia22]

I have a '22 Soul purchased new in Dallas, Texas in March of this year. The car currently has less than 10k miles on it.

Twice now in the past 2 months, the dashboard screen that sits between the Tachometer and Speedometer has changed the language from English to Danish after starting the car.
I assume it's Danish by what Google translate says.

The language on the radio can be changed to four different languages: English, French, Spanish, and Korean. These settings do not affect the dashboard.

When the setting changes to Danish, I can go down until I see "Nulstil" (reset in Danish) and attempt to reset it by selecting "Ja" ("yes" in Danish) to reset all the dashboard settings. However, this does not reset the language. According the the car's owner manual, page 61, "All menus in the user settings mode are reset to factory settings, except language and service interval." There are no other settings listed that indicate the language can be changed. I assume its a hidden menu or something programmed from the factory.

The last time this happened a month ago, I turned off the car, went into gas station to buy a soda, and it switched back to English when I restarted the car. I did not put any gasoline in the car that day. Today when it happened it did not automatically reset itself after restarting the car a few minutes later. I even took it to the nearest Kia dealership to see if they had any clue on how to fix it, and before I knew it I had several tech's yelling at each other "You gotta check this out!" and they poured over it for 20 minutes trying to figure it out as they had never seen it before. Several resets and restarting the ignition did nothing. Unfortunately, it was closing time, but they did suggest disconnecting the battery, which would be the simplest solution given that it reset itself last time.

This language change occurs immediately after starting the car without me changing any dashboard settings or pressing any buttons during startup. The only setting I changed prior to stopping at the gas station today when it happened was the dashboard brightness since the sun was low and I couldn't read it. Immediately after filling the tank the language changed. Please note these same events did not occur when it happened last month as I did not put gas in the vehicle both times. I initially thought it could be a bug with it resetting the fuel gauge, but that does not appear to be the case.

I got home and left the car off for 2 hours...by then it finally reset on its own. Has anyone seen this before? I tried a forum search and could not find anything. I've tried searching elsewhere but all I get are discussions and videos about the radio's language setting, not the dashboard. Are there any fixes or is there a hidden menu I do not know about?

Pics below.

When it happened a month ago...

After 10 minutes and restarting the car...

Today...note the change in mileage...

 

[DualClutch]

Is this happening when your cellphone is plugged in?

That's probably a stupid question. Hmmmmm....

I'd say it was a chip issue and something that you need to contact Kia about. Not a local dealership but Kia.Com contact us.

 

[ClarkKia22]

Is this happening when your cellphone is plugged in?

That's probably a stupid question. Hmmmmm....

I'd say it was a chip issue and something that you need to contact Kia about. Not a local dealership but Kia.Com contact us.

Not really a stupid question. This is a strange enough occurrence that I'm willing to entertain other possibilities even if the probability is low. And there are some connections between the radio unit and this dashboard screen through the use of the steering wheel controls.

But to answer your question... No, no cellphone was plugged into the Android Auto/Apple Carplay specific USB plug. Either my phone (LG G8 Thinq) or my wife's phone (Samsung S21) was connected via bluetooth at the time this occurred, but I was not using Android Auto or even the bluetooth audio at the time. FWIW, both phones are set to English. I also do not speak Danish or ever studied it, so I would have no reason to pick this language even if the option existed in the menu. I do find it curious that it has only switched to Danish so far.

The dealership recommended I call their customer service number 800-333-4KIA. But after 45 minutes on hold I gave up. This glitch isn't harmful enough for me to waste that kind of time.

I will try contacting them via Kia.com instead.

 

[Andromeda 2022]

Ever heard the expression....." A ghost in the machine" ??? Sounds like you got one. Or, maybe a poltergeist! Maybe your car just needs an Exorcism? We're not supposed to believe, in such things, but sometimes it's hard not to. I know of a young Christian man who had a transmission failure, and he had to get to work, so he laid hands on the car and rebuked that failure, got in the car and drove on to work. Stranger things have happened.

Good Luck,

 

[leo42.2875]

The difference in the odometer may be a translation of miles to Kilometers as used in Europe.

 

[ClarkKia22]

The difference in the odometer may be a translation of miles to Kilometers as used in Europe.

The odometer is in US miles in both cases. I point out the difference in the odometer as proof this occurred on 2 different occasions, approximately 1 month apart. The other unit listed (miles per gallon) is also US Customary units. So in both occurrences the language changed, but the unit of measurement did not. You will also note in the 3rd pic that the average mpg is cleared out because I had just done a reset to try and get the language to change back.

Both times this occurred, I was unable to switch the language back on my own, the car simply did it itself after a set amount of time of being shut off. The first time only took 10 minutes, the second time a couple hours. It may have switched back sooner than that, but I did not check.

 

[Mercedes]

My new Soul with 5000 miles did this today, any solutions yet?

 

[Andromeda 2022]

Sir, I've heard that if the battery is disconnected for some time (???) the master computer will revert back to factory defaults when the power is restored.
I've never had any reason to try that on my own car, but have YOU?

On all the cars that KIA sends to the US, English should be the default language, and Miles should be the default Odometer display.

 

[Ieatpeople365]

I had the same thing happen to my 22 LX back in April. I started the Soul and my cluster was in Danish. Spent about 30min trying to figure out how to change it back (messed with the radio settings, reset everything, checked the owners manual), eventually gave up and figured I'd call the dealer later that day. The next time I drove the car (about 2hrs later) it reset to English on its own. Hasnt happened again, so far.