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 4-door sedan 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 FIAT-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 5-cylinder, 20-valves 155hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 20-valves 150hp engine designed by Audi.

The fact that the Audi got tested by the European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), while the other contender didn't, isn't really an advantage, taken the poor 3-star rating it received. Still, apart from the official crash test results there are other things we need to be aware of. 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. Furthermore, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the Italian 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 Lancia does have a slight advantage, all the models observed together. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of Lancia with an average rating of 4.1, and models under the Audi badge with 4.2 out of 5. Independent research findings rank Lybra as average reliability-wise, and A4 is more or less at the same level.Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as the Italian car rank it on average as 4.5 out of 5, exactly the same as the other one.

Audi is undoubtly more agile, reaching 100km/h in 1.3 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 221 kilometers per hour, 11km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the German car, averaging around 7.9 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (36 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 24% difference compared to the Italian car.

Lancia 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 German car offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. It all continues in the same direction, with Audi 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 Audi. 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 thousands of similar, yet so different vehicles.