Two significantly similar cars, no doubt about that. Still, each one has something different to offer. Having both cars powered by diesel engines and utilizing the 4-door sedan body style within the same 'Large family car' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (front for the Alfa Romeo and rear in the case of the BMW). The first one has a FIAT-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 BMW.

The fact that the BMW got tested by the European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), while the other contender didn't, offers a slight advantage, as the 4-star rating is better than none. Moving further on, let's take a closer look at some additional safety-related facts. Both vehicles belong to the large family car segment, which is generally a good thing safety-wise, but it doesn't do much to help us decide between the two. On the other hand, taking kerb weight as an important factor into account, the German car offers a marginal difference of 7% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that BMW 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 Alfa Romeo, as well as BMW, with the same average rating of 4.2 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed 156 as average reliability-wise, and 3 Series is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as the Italian car rank it on average as 4.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.4 out of 5.

BMW is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.6 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 207 kilometers per hour, 19km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 5.8 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (49 mpg), in combined cycle.

BMW 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 German car beats the other contender by far, making it the best choice without even considering other things. It all continues in the same direction, with BMW 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 BMW. 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. 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™, out of 12.000+ vehicles we currently have in our database.