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Virtual Adviser's™ opinion
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 3-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 Rover-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 103hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 100hp engine designed by Volkswagen.
SafetyA 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 Seat 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 that fact doesn't break the tie between the two cars. Furthermore, taking kerb weight as an important factor into account, the British car offers a marginal difference of 5% more metal.
ReliabilityI don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that Seat does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of MG with an average rating of 5.0, and models under the Seat 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. That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as the British car rank it on average as 4.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 2.7 out of 5.
Performance & Fuel economyMG is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.2 seconds less than its competitor. Still, it lacks the power to win the top speed competition, topping at 179 kilometers per hour, 12km/h less than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be the Spanish car, averaging around 6.9 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (41 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 32% difference compared to the British car!
Verdict
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 Spanish car offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. It all continues in the same direction, with Seat offering somewhat better performance, just enough to call it quicker. 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 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 more than 12.000 different ones in our database.