Overview

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 Honda-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 320hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 182hp engine designed by Ford.

Safety

Both vehicles got tested by European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), with the same number of safety stars gained in the process. 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, but it doesn't do much to help us decide between the two. Furthermore, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the Japanese car offers a marginal difference of 1% more metal.

Reliability

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that Honda does have a slight advantage, at least on all of the models level. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of Honda with an average rating of 4.7, and models under the Ford badge with 4.4 out of 5. Independent research findings rank Civic as average reliability-wise, and Focus is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as the Japanese car rank it on average as 3.0 out of 5, exactly the same as the other one.

Performance & Fuel economy

Honda is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 2.5 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 272 kilometers per hour, 50km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be the American car, averaging around 5.5 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (51 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 40% difference compared to the Japanese car!

Verdict

Honda 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 Japanese car offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. 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... I believe that, when we take all into account, we have only one winner here - the Ford. 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. 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™, out of 12.000+ vehicles we currently have in our database.