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 wagon body style within the same 'Luxury car' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (front for the Volvo and rear in the case of the Jaguar). The first one has a Mazda-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 240hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 8-cylinder, 32-valves 550hp engine designed by Jaguar.

The first thing to look into here would be the results from European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) tests performed on the two cars. Good thing is that both vehicles got tested, with the Volvo being a slightly better choice apparently. That aside, let's consider some other aspects which affect safety. Both vehicles belong to the luxury car segment, which is generally a very good thing safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? On the other hand, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the British car offers a considerable difference of 29% more metal.

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that Volvo does have a slight advantage, at least on all of the models level. These are the results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of Volvo with an average rating of 3.2, and models under the Jaguar badge with 4.2 out of 5. The same official information place V70 as average reliability-wise, and XF is more or less at the same level.Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as the Swedish car rank it on average as 3.6, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 3.0 out of 5.

Jaguar is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 2.9 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 300 kilometers per hour, 60km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be the Swedish car, averaging around 8.1 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (35 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 57% difference compared to the British car!

Volvo 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 Jaguar outracing its opponent in any situation possible, making it better choice for boy racers. 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 Volvo. 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 thousands of similar, yet so different vehicles.