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 hatchback 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 Volkswagen-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 115hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 136hp engine designed by Peugeot.

The fact that the Peugeot 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. Still, apart from the official crash test results there are other things we need to be aware of. Both vehicles belong to the small family car segment, which is generally classifying them somewhere in the middle 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 French car offers a marginal difference of 4% more metal.

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that Peugeot does have a slight advantage, all the models observed together. These are the results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of Volkswagen with an average rating of 4.2, and models under the Peugeot badge with 4.3 out of 5. The same official information place Golf as average reliability-wise, and 306 is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as the German car rank it on average as 4.1, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.2 out of 5.

Volkswagen is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.3 seconds less than its competitor. Still, it lacks the power to win the top speed competition, topping at 198 kilometers per hour, 4km/h less than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 8.9 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (32 mpg), in combined cycle.

Peugeot 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 my opinion, everything taken into account, the French car offers much better overall protection, which launches it ahead of the other contender. From there things take a different direction, with Volkswagen offering somewhat better performance, just enough to call it quicker. To make things even better, it consumps less fuel! At the end, as much as I'd like to give you a winner here, it's simply a pure tie if you ask me. Nevertheless, let's not forget that people have different preferences and needs, so what really counts is your personal feel. I'm only here to help. 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.