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Virtual Adviser's™ opinion
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 5-door wagon 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 4 x 4 in the case of the Subaru). The first one has a BMW-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 6-cylinder, 24-valves 272hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 167hp engine designed by Subaru.
SafetyThe 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 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 large family car segment, which is generally a good thing safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? Furthermore, taking kerb weight as an important factor into account, the German car offers a marginal difference of 1% more metal.
ReliabilityI don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that Subaru does have a slight advantage, all the models observed together. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of BMW, as well as Subaru, with the same average rating of 4.2 out of 5. Independent research findings rank 3 Series as average reliability-wise, and Legacy is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as the German car rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 2.0 out of 5.
Performance & Fuel economyBMW is way more agile, reaching 100km/h in 4.1 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 250 kilometers per hour, 45km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the German car, averaging around 7.6 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (37 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 11% difference compared to the Japanese car.
Verdict
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 offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. It all continues in the same direction, with BMW outracing its opponent in any situation possible, making it better choice for boy racers. 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. 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 more than 12.000 different ones in our database.