Well, these are two pretty similar cars we have here! It's only details that could potentially make the difference. Considering they both belong to the small family car segment and utilize the same 5-door wagon body style and the front wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific petrol engine choice they offer. The first one has a Nissan-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 3-cylinder, 12-valves 90hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 106hp engine designed by Lada.

The fact that the Dacia 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. That aside, let's consider some other aspects which affect safety. Both vehicles belong to the small family car segment, which is generally classifying them somewhere in the middle safety-wise, but that fact doesn't break the tie between the two cars. On the other hand, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the Russian car offers a considerable difference of 18% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that both brands display similar results in faults and breakdowns, all the models observed together. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of Dacia with an average rating of 4.1, and models under the Lada badge with 4.3 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed Logan as average reliability-wise, and Vesta is more or less at the same level.That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as the Romanian car rank it on average as 4.6, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.8 out of 5.

Dacia is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.2 seconds less than its competitor. Still, it lacks the power to win the top speed competition, topping at 170 kilometers per hour, 8km/h less than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be the Romanian car, averaging around 5.1 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (55 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 47% difference compared to the Russian car!

Lada 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 Dacia offering somewhat better performance, just enough to call it quicker. To make things even better, it consumps less fuel! All together, there's not much more to say, in this case I wouldn't even consider anything but Dacia. Anyway, that's the most objective conclusion I could've came up with and it's based solely on the information found on this website. Aspects such as design, practicality, brand value and driving experience are there for you to measure them out. 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™, among more than 12.000 different ones in our database.