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 luxury car segment and utilize the same 5-door wagon body style and the 4 x 4 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, 16-valves 280hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 245hp engine designed by Mercedes Benz.

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 luxury car segment, which is generally a very good thing safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it?

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that Škoda as a brand displays somewhat better results, when all the models are taken into account. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of Škoda with an average rating of 4.3, and models under the Mercedes Benz badge with 4.4 out of 5. The same official information place Superb as average reliability-wise, and E is more or less at the same level.Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as the Czech car rank it on average as 4.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 3.0 out of 5.

There's not enough data for me to elaborate on the subject, I'm affraid.

Škoda 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 this case though, it seems that both cars show similar levels of passenger protection all together, so that won't break a tie. When it comes to performance, both vehicles provide similar experience, so I wouldn't point any of them out. Fuel consumption is more or less the same. It's really tough to make a final decision here, but if I'd need to, I'd say Škoda. 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™, among more than 12.000 different ones in our database.