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 petrol engine choice they offer. The first one has a Peugeot-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 61hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 69hp engine designed by FIAT.

Both vehicles got tested by European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), with the same number of safety stars gained in the process. 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, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the French car offers a marginal difference of 8% more metal.

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that FIAT does have a slight advantage, all the models observed together. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of Citroen with an average rating of 4.1, and models under the FIAT badge with 4.3 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed C3 as average reliability-wise, and Panda is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as the French car rank it on average as 4.4, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.0 out of 5.

FIAT is way more agile, reaching 100km/h in 3.1 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 164 kilometers per hour, 9km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the Italian car, averaging around 5.1 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (55 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 16% difference compared to the French car.

FIAT 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 French car offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. From there things take a different direction, with FIAT outracing its opponent in any situation possible, making it better choice for boy racers. 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 FIAT. Anyway, that's the most objective conclusion I could've came up with and it's based solely on the information found on this website. Aspects such as design, practicality, brand value and driving experience are there for you to measure them out. Also, you could use the oportunity to find out which car, everything taken into account, would be the perfect choice for you in the eyes of the virtual adviser™, out of 12.000+ vehicles we currently have in our database.