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 city car segment and utilize the same 5-door hatchback body style and the front wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific diesel engine choice they offer. The first one has a Peugeot-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 85hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 90hp engine designed by Renault.

The first thing to look into here would be the results from European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) tests performed on the two cars. Good thing is that both vehicles got tested, with the Ford being a slightly better choice apparently. Still, apart from the official crash test results there are other things we need to be aware of. Both vehicles belong to the city car segment, which is generally not a very good thing safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it?

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 Ford with an average rating of 4.4, and models under the Nissan badge with 4.3 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed Fiesta as average reliability-wise, and Micra is more or less at the same level.That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as the American car rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.5 out of 5.

Nissan is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.7 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 179 kilometers per hour, 9km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the Japanese car, averaging around 3.2 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (88 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 25% difference compared to the American car.

Nissan 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 American car offers significantly better overall protection, taking the lead here. From there things take a different direction, with Nissan being considerably quicker, thus putting more smile on driver's face. 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 Nissan. 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. 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.