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 city car segment and utilize the same 5-door hatchback body style and the front wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific diesel engine choice they offer. The first one has a Rover-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 113hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 90hp engine designed by Peugeot.

A starting point here would be to take a look at the results from European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) tests which were performed on both of the cars, with the Ford being a slightly better choice apparently. That aside, let's consider some other aspects which affect safety. Both vehicles belong to the city car segment, which is generally not a very good thing safety-wise, but it doesn't do much to help us decide between the two. Furthermore, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the British car offers a marginal difference of 1% more metal.

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that Ford as a brand displays somewhat better results, all the models observed together. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of MG with an average rating of 5.0, and models under the Ford badge with 4.4 out of 5. Unfortunatelly, I don't have enough insight that would allow me to comment in more details on the specific models level. Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as the British car rank it on average as 5.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.3 out of 5.

MG is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 2.2 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 187 kilometers per hour, 7km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be the American car, averaging around 4.5 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (63 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 71% difference compared to the British car!

MG 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 American car offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. From there things take a different direction, with MG 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... It's not difficult to say then that if I'd need to make a choice, it would definitely be the Ford. 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™, out of 12.000+ vehicles we currently have in our database.