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 luxury car segment and utilize the same 4-door sedan body style and the rear wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific petrol engine choice they offer. The first one has a BMW-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 6-cylinder, 24-valves 272hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 6-cylinder, 24-valves 231hp engine designed by Mercedes Benz.

Both vehicles got tested by European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), with the Mercedes Benz being a slightly better choice apparently. That aside, let's consider some other aspects which affect safety. 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. On the other hand, taking kerb weight as an important factor into account, Mercedes Benz E offers a marginal difference of 4% more metal.

Reliability is not the best thing to consider on the make level, but it is worth mentioning that both brands display similar results in faults and breakdowns, all the models observed together. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of BMW with an average rating of 4.1, and models under the Mercedes Benz badge with 4.3 out of 5. The same official information place 5 Series as average reliability-wise, and E is more or less at the same level.Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as 5 Series rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.5 out of 5.

BMW is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 1 seconds less than its competitor. Still, it lacks the power to win the top speed competition, topping at 250 kilometers per hour, exactly the same as the other car does. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be 5 Series, averaging around 7.7 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (37 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 21% difference compared to Mercedes Benz E.

Mercedes Benz 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, Mercedes Benz E offers much better overall protection, which launches it ahead of the other contender. From there things take a different direction, with BMW being considerably quicker, thus putting more smile on driver's face. To make things even better, it consumps less fuel! No mistake, whatever you decide here, but I'd still go for the BMW. 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.