Two significantly similar cars, no doubt about that. Still, each one has something different to offer. Having both cars powered by petrol engines and utilizing the 4-door sedan body style within the same 'Luxury car' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (rear for the BMW and front in the case of the SAAB). The first one has a BMW-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 10-cylinder, 40-valves 507hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 6-cylinder, 24-valves 200hp engine designed by Opel.

The first thing to look into here would be the results from European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) tests performed on the two cars. Good thing is that both vehicles got tested, with the SAAB being a slightly better choice apparently. Moving further on, let's take a closer look at some additional safety-related facts. 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, the German car offers a marginal difference of 9% more metal.

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that SAAB does have a slight advantage, at least on all of the models level. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of BMW with an average rating of 4.2, and models under the SAAB badge with 4.1 out of 5. Independent research findings rank 5 Series as average reliability-wise, and 9-5 is more or less at the same level.That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as the German car rank it on average as 1.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 3.0 out of 5.

BMW is way more agile, reaching 100km/h in 4.2 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 250 kilometers per hour, 15km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be the Swedish car, averaging around 11.1 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (25 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 33% difference compared to the German car!

SAAB 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 Swedish car offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. From there things take a different direction, with BMW 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 SAAB. 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.