Well, these are two pretty similar cars we have here! It's only details that could potentially make the difference. Not only that they both belong to the small family car segment and utilize the same 5-door wagon body style, they are even powered by the same Volkswagen-developed petrol engine! There is not much there to point us towards one vehicle or the other. Or is it?

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 Volkswagen 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 small family car segment, which is generally classifying them somewhere in the middle safety-wise, but it doesn't do much to help us decide between the two.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that Volkswagen does have a slight advantage, at least on all of the models level. These are the results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of Volkswagen, as well as Audi, with the same average rating of 4.2 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed Golf as average reliability-wise, and A3 is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as these two vehicles rank it on average as 3.8 out of 5.

Both of the cars accelerate exactly the same, so we couldn't put one above the other. Car No. 1 reaches top speed of 190 kilometers per hour, exactly the same as the other car does. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 5.4 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (52 mpg), in combined cycle.

Volkswagen 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, Golf offers significantly better overall protection, taking the lead here. When it comes to performance, both vehicles provide similar experience, so I wouldn't point any of them out. Golf still consumps less fuel, which needs to be taken into consideration. All together, there's not much more to say, in this case I wouldn't even consider anything but Volkswagen. 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. 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.