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 'Large family car' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (front for the Volkswagen and rear in the case of the BMW). The first one has a Volkswagen-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 150hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 136hp engine designed by Peugeot.

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 same number of safety stars gained in the process. That aside, let's consider some other aspects which affect safety. Both vehicles belong to the large family car segment, which is generally a good thing safety-wise, but that fact doesn't break the tie between the two cars. On the other hand, when it comes to weight, a factor that most people underestimate, 3 Series offers a marginal difference of 9% more metal.

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 official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of Volkswagen with an average rating of 4.2, and models under the BMW badge with 4.1 out of 5. The same official information place Passat as average reliability-wise, and 3 Series is more or less at the same level.Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as Passat rank it on average as 4.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 3.2 out of 5.

Volkswagen is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.5 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 220 kilometers per hour, 10km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 5.2 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (54 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, 3 Series offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. From there things take a different direction, with Volkswagen 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 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.