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 suv body style within the same 'SUV' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (front for the Toyota and 4 x 4 in the case of the Honda). The first one has a Toyota-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 125hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 127hp engine designed by Honda.

Unfortunatelly, neither of the two vehicles was submitted to the European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) testing. This makes it virtually impossible for me to pick one over the other and I'm generally against buying such cars as the safety should really always come first. Still, apart from the official crash test results there are other things we need to be aware of. Both vehicles belong to the suv segment, which is generally a very good thing safety-wise, but it doesn't do much to help us decide between the two. On the other hand, when it comes to weight, a factor that most people underestimate, CR-V offers a considerable difference of 13% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that Honda does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of Toyota with an average rating of 4.6, and models under the Honda badge with 4.7 out of 5. Independent research findings rank RAV4 as average reliability-wise, and CR-V is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as RAV4 rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 5.0 out of 5.

Honda is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 1.7 seconds less than its competitor. Still, it lacks the power to win the top speed competition, topping at 174 kilometers per hour, 1km/h less than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be RAV4, averaging around 7.4 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (38 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 43% difference compared to CR-V!

Honda is apparently more reliable, not too much, but just enough. The most important thing when deciding between any two vehicles should always be safety, both passive and active. In my opinion, everything taken into account, CR-V offers significantly better overall protection, taking the lead here. It all continues in the same direction, with Honda being considerably quicker, thus putting more smile on driver's face. It does come at a cost though, and that's the fuel consumption... It's really tough to make a final decision here, but if I'd need to, I'd say Toyota. 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. In case you have two minutes to spare I invite you to define your needs, desires and budget and see which car would be chosen by the virtual adviser™, among more than 12.000 different ones in our database.