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 luxury car segment and utilize the same 4-door sedan body style and the rear wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific diesel engine choice they offer. The first one has a Ford-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 6-cylinder, 24-valves 275hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 6-cylinder, 24-valves 265hp engine designed by Mercedes Benz.

The fact that the Jaguar got tested by the European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), while the other contender didn't, offers a slight advantage, as the 4-star rating is better than none. Still, apart from the official crash test results there are other things we need to be aware of. Both vehicles belong to the luxury car segment, which is generally a very 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 British car offers a marginal difference of 3% more metal.

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that both brands display similar results in faults and breakdowns, when all the models are taken into account. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of Jaguar with an average rating of 4.1, and models under the Mercedes Benz badge with 4.4 out of 5. The same official information place XF as average reliability-wise, and CLS is more or less at the same level.That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as the British car rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.8 out of 5.

Mercedes Benz is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.2 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 250 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 6 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (47 mpg), in combined cycle.

Mercedes Benz 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 British car beats the other contender by far, making it the best choice without even considering other things. From there things take a different direction, with Mercedes Benz offering somewhat better performance, just enough to call it quicker. Fuel consumption is more or less the same. I believe that, when we take all into account, we have only one winner here - the Jaguar. 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™, out of 12.000+ vehicles we currently have in our database.