Overview

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 lpg engine choice they offer. Both the engines are Nissan-engineered . The first one has a 3-cylinder, 12-valves 122hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 3-cylinder, 12-valves 101hp one.

Safety

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 Renault showing an incomparably higher level of safety offered. Still, apart from the official crash test results there are other things we need to be aware of. 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 Romanian car offers a marginal difference of 1% more metal.

Reliability

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that Renault does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of Dacia with an average rating of 4.1, and models under the Renault badge with 4.2 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 Romanian car rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 5.0 out of 5.

Performance & Fuel economy

Dacia is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 1.7 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 180 kilometers per hour, 6km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 6.9 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (41 mpg), in combined cycle.

Verdict

Renault 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 French car beats the other contender by far, making it the best choice without even considering other things. From there things take a different direction, with Dacia outracing its opponent in any situation possible, making it better choice for boy racers. To make things even better, it consumps less fuel! No mistake, whatever you decide here, but I'd still go for the Renault. 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.