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 mpv segment and utilize the same 5-door MPV 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 Mazda-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 100hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 112hp engine designed by Mitsubishi.

Both vehicles got tested by European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), 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 mpv segment, which is generally a good thing safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? Furthermore, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, Premacy offers a marginal difference of 6% more metal.

I don't like generalizing things when it comes to reliability, although it does seem that Mazda does have a slight advantage, all the models observed together. These are the results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of Mazda with an average rating of 4.4, and models under the Mitsubishi badge with 4.6 out of 5. Independent research findings rank Premacy as average reliability-wise, and Space Star is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as Premacy rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.0 out of 5.

Mitsubishi 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 185 kilometers per hour, 10km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be Space Star, averaging around 7.7 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (37 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 9% difference compared to Premacy.

Mitsubishi 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, Premacy offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. From there things take a different direction, with Mitsubishi being considerably quicker, thus putting more smile on driver's face. 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 Mitsubishi. 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.