Two significantly similar cars, no doubt about that. Still, each one has something different to offer. Having both cars powered by hybrid engines and utilizing the 5-door wagon body style within the same 'Luxury car' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (4 x 4 for the Porsche and rear in the case of the BMW). The first one has a Volkswagen-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 8-cylinder, 32-valves 680hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 252hp 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, 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 luxury car segment, which is generally a very good thing safety-wise, but that fact doesn't break the tie between the two cars. Furthermore, when it comes to weight, a factor that most people underestimate, Panamera offers a potentially life-saving difference of 31% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that BMW does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. These are the results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of Porsche with an average rating of 3.7, and models under the BMW badge with 4.2 out of 5. Unfortunatelly, I don't have enough insight that would allow me to comment in more details on the specific models level. We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as Panamera rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.3 out of 5.

Porsche is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 2.8 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 310 kilometers per hour, 75km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be 5 Series, averaging around 1.9 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (149 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 58% difference compared to Panamera.

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, 5 Series offers much better overall protection, which launches it ahead of the other contender. From there things take a different direction, with Porsche being considerably quicker, thus putting more smile on driver's face. 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™, out of 12.000+ vehicles we currently have in our database.