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 sports car segment and utilize the same 2-door cabriolet body style and the rear wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific petrol engine choice they offer. The first one has a Porsche-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 6-cylinder, 24-valves 220hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 193hp engine designed by Mercedes Benz.

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. Moving further on, let's take a closer look at some additional safety-related facts. Both vehicles belong to the sports 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, taking kerb weight as an important factor into account, CLK offers a considerable difference of 16% more metal.

Reliability is not the best thing to consider on the make level, but it is worth mentioning that Mercedes Benz does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of Porsche with an average rating of 3.7, and models under the Mercedes Benz badge with 4.4 out of 5. The same official information place Boxster as average reliability-wise, and CLK is more or less at the same level.That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as Boxster rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 5.0 out of 5.

Porsche is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 2.2 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 250 kilometers per hour, 20km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 9.8 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (29 mpg), in combined cycle.

Mercedes Benz 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, CLK offers significantly better overall protection, taking the lead here. From there things take a different direction, with Porsche 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 not difficult to say then that if I'd need to make a choice, it would definitely be the Mercedes Benz. 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 thousands of similar, yet so different vehicles.