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 Mitsubishi-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 136hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 145hp engine designed by Hyundai.

The fact that the Hyundai 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, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? Furthermore, when it comes to weight, a factor that most people underestimate, Magentis offers a considerable difference of 16% more metal.

Reliability is not the best thing to consider on the make level, but it is worth mentioning that Hyundai does have a slight advantage, at least on all of the models level. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of KIA with an average rating of 4.6, and models under the Hyundai badge with 4.5 out of 5. The same official information place Magentis as average reliability-wise, and Elantra is more or less at the same level.Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as Magentis rank it on average as 4.4, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.7 out of 5.

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

Hyundai 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 this case though, it seems that both cars show similar levels of passenger protection all together, so that won't break a tie. 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. It's really tough to make a final decision here, but if I'd need to, I'd say Hyundai. 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™, among more than 12.000 different ones in our database.