Two significantly similar cars, no doubt about that. Still, each one has something different to offer. Having both cars powered by petrol 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 (rear for the BMW and front in the case of the Chrysler). The first one has a BMW-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 8-cylinder, 32-valves 420hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 6-cylinder, 24-valves 186hp engine designed by Chrysler.

The fact that the BMW got tested by the European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), while the other contender didn't, puts it sky-high safety-wise, in my eyes at least. Still, apart from the official crash test results there are other things we need to be aware of. Both vehicles belong to the large family car segment, which is generally a good thing safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? Furthermore, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the German car offers a marginal difference of 9% more metal.

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that BMW does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of BMW with an average rating of 4.1, and models under the Chrysler badge with 4.4 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed 3 Series as average reliability-wise, and Sebring is more or less at the same level.Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as the German car rank it on average as 3.0 out of 5, exactly the same as the other one.

BMW is way more agile, reaching 100km/h in 5.4 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 250 kilometers per hour, 40km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be the American car, averaging around 9.9 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (29 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 25% difference compared to the German car!

Chrysler 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 outracing its opponent in any situation possible, making it better choice for boy racers. It does come at a cost though, and that's the fuel consumption... 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™, among more than 12.000 different ones in our database.