Two significantly similar cars, no doubt about that. Still, each one has something different to offer. Having both cars powered by petrol engines and utilizing the 2-door cabriolet body style within the same 'Sports car' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (rear for the Mazda and front in the case of the FIAT). The first one has a Mazda-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 140hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 130hp engine designed by FIAT.

The fact that the Mazda 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. Moving further on, let's take a closer look at some additional safety-related facts. Both vehicles belong to the sports car segment, which is generally classifying them somewhere in the middle safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? On the other hand, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the Italian car offers a marginal difference of 6% 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 results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of Mazda with an average rating of 4.4, and models under the FIAT badge with 4.3 out of 5. Unfortunatelly, I don't have enough insight that would allow me to comment in more details on the specific models level. We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as the Japanese car rank it on average as 3.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 1.0 out of 5.

Mazda is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.9 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 205 kilometers per hour, 5km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 8.5 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (33 mpg), in combined cycle.

Mazda 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 much better overall protection, which launches it ahead of the other contender. It all continues in the same direction, with Mazda offering somewhat better performance, just enough to call it quicker. Fuel consumption is more or less the same. All together, there's not much more to say, in this case I wouldn't even consider anything but Mazda. 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. Also, you could use the oportunity to find out which car, everything taken into account, would be the perfect choice for you in the eyes of the virtual adviser™, out of 12.000+ vehicles we currently have in our database.