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 small family car segment and utilize the same 5-door hatchback body style and the front wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific petrol engine choice they offer. The first one has a Hyundai-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 160hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 150hp engine designed by Volkswagen.

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 small family car segment, which is generally classifying them somewhere in the middle safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? On the other hand, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the Spanish car offers a marginal difference of 5% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that Hyundai does have a slight advantage, at least on all of the models level. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of Hyundai with an average rating of 4.5, and models under the Seat badge with 4.4 out of 5. Independent research findings rank i30 as average reliability-wise, and Leon is more or less at the same level.That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as the Korean car rank it on average as 4.5 out of 5, exactly the same as the other one.

Both of the cars accelerate exactly the same, so we couldn't put one above the other. Car No. 2 is faster though, reaching top speed of 221 kilometers per hour, 11km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the Spanish car, averaging around 5 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (57 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 14% difference compared to the Korean car.

Hyundai 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 Spanish car offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. When it comes to performance, both vehicles provide similar experience, so I wouldn't point any of them out. the Spanish car , on the other hand, consumps significantly less fuel, and that's a big plus. All together, there's not much more to say, in this case I wouldn't even consider anything but Seat. 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 thousands of similar, yet so different vehicles.