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 4-door sedan 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 Nissan-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 3-cylinder, 12-valves 65hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 128hp engine designed by Hyundai.

The fact that the Dacia got tested by the European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), while the other contender didn't, doesn't actually do much for it, as it's still a lousy 2-star coffin on wheels. Moving further on, let's take a closer look at some additional safety-related facts. 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, when it comes to weight, a factor that most people underestimate, the Korean car offers a considerable difference of 19% 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 Dacia with an average rating of 4.1, and models under the Hyundai badge with 4.5 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 the Romanian car rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 5.0 out of 5.

Hyundai is way more agile, reaching 100km/h in 6.6 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 200 kilometers per hour, 40km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the Romanian car, averaging around 4.9 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (58 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 33% difference compared to the Korean car.

Hyundai 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 my opinion, everything taken into account, the Korean car offers significantly better overall protection, taking the lead here. It all continues in the same direction, with Hyundai 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 Hyundai. Anyway, that's the most objective conclusion I could've came up with and it's based solely on the information found on this website. Aspects such as design, practicality, brand value and driving experience are there for you to measure them out. 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.