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 large family car segment and utilize the same 5-door wagon 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 Volkswagen-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 200hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 150hp engine designed by Toyota.

Both vehicles got tested by European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), with the Toyota being a slightly better choice apparently. 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, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? Furthermore, when it comes to weight, a factor that most people underestimate, the Czech car offers a marginal difference of 1% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that both brands display similar results in faults and breakdowns, when all the models are taken into account. These are the results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of Škoda with an average rating of 4.3, and models under the Toyota badge with 4.6 out of 5. The same official information place Octavia as average reliability-wise, and Avensis is more or less at the same level.Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as the Czech car rank it on average as 4.4, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.6 out of 5.

Škoda is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 2.3 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 239 kilometers per hour, 29km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 7.8 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (36 mpg), in combined cycle.

Toyota 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 Japanese car offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. From there things take a different direction, with Škoda 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 Škoda. 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.