SARS‐CoV‐2 virus, a member of the Coronaviridae family, causes Covid‐19 pandemic disease with severe respiratory illness. Multiple strategies enable SARS‐CoV‐2 to eventually overcome antiviral innate immune mechanisms which are important components of viral pathogenesis. This review considers several mechanisms of SARS‐CoV‐2 innate immune evasion including suppression of IFN‐α/β production at the earliest stage of infection, mechanisms that exhaust natural killer cell‐mediated cytotoxicity, overstimulation of NLRP3 inflammasome and induction of a cytokine storm. A comparison with SARS‐CoV is made. Greater knowledge of these and other immune evasion tactics may provide us with improved possibilities for research into this novel deadly virus.