Two significantly similar cars, no doubt about that. Still, each one has something different to offer. Having both cars powered by petrol engines and utilizing the 5-door hatchback body style within the same 'City car' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (front for the FIAT and 4 x 4 in the case of the Subaru). The first one has a FIAT-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 60hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 92hp engine designed by Suzuki.

The fact that the FIAT got tested by the European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), while the other contender didn't, isn't really an advantage, taken the poor 3-star rating it received. Moving further on, let's take a closer look at some additional safety-related facts. Both vehicles belong to the city car segment, which is generally not a very good thing safety-wise, but it doesn't do much to help us decide between the two. On the other hand, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the Japanese car offers a considerable difference of 20% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that FIAT does have a slight advantage, all the models observed together. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of FIAT with an average rating of 4.3, and models under the Subaru badge with 4.2 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed Panda as average reliability-wise, and Justy is more or less at the same level.That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as the Italian car rank it on average as 4.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.3 out of 5.

Subaru is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 2.3 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 155 kilometers per hour, exactly the same as the other car does. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the Italian car, averaging around 5 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (57 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 38% difference compared to the Japanese car.

FIAT appears just a bit more reliable, although the difference is truly marginal. The most important thing when deciding between any two vehicles should always be safety, both passive and active. In this case though, it seems that both cars show similar levels of passenger protection all together, so that won't break a tie. But one thing that actually could is the performance, with Subaru being considerably quicker, thus putting more smile on driver's face. It does come at a cost though, and that's the fuel consumption... No mistake, whatever you decide here, but I'd still go for the FIAT. In any case that's my personal view, built upon all the data available to me. What should decide here though is the way you feel about the two vehicles, and I hope you'll find my guidelines useful in the process. Also, you could use the oportunity to find out which car, everything taken into account, would be the perfect choice for you in the eyes of the virtual adviser™, out of 12.000+ vehicles we currently have in our database.