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 small family car segment and utilize the same 5-door hatchback body style and the front wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific diesel engine choice they offer. The first one has a Hyundai-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 115hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 121hp engine designed by VM Motori.

The fact that the KIA 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. That aside, let's consider some other aspects which affect safety. 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. Furthermore, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the Korean car offers a marginal difference of 2% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that Chevrolet does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. These are the results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of KIA with an average rating of 4.6, and models under the Chevrolet badge with 4.2 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed Cerato as average reliability-wise, and Lacetti is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as the Korean car rank it on average as 4.6, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.9 out of 5.

There's not enough data for me to elaborate on the subject, I'm affraid.

Chevrolet 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 Korean car offers much better overall protection, which launches it ahead of the other contender. When it comes to performance, both vehicles provide similar experience, so I wouldn't point any of them out. Fuel consumption is more or less the same. No mistake, whatever you decide here, but I'd still go for the KIA. 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.