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 diesel engine! There is not much there to point us towards one vehicle or the other. Or is it?

The first thing to look into here would be the results from European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) tests performed on the two cars. Good thing is that both vehicles got tested, 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 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. On the other hand, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, Golf offers a considerable difference of 14% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that Volkswagen does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of Audi, as well as Volkswagen, with the same average rating of 4.2 out of 5. Independent research findings rank A3 as average reliability-wise, and Golf is more or less at the same level.Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as these two vehicles rank it on average as 4.6 out of 5.

Audi is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.4 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 214 kilometers per hour, 7km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 4.8 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (59 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. From there things take a different direction, with Audi 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 Audi. 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.