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 suv segment and utilize the same 3-door suv body style and the 4 x 4 wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific petrol engine choice they offer. The first one has a Lada-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 82hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 83hp engine designed by Suzuki.

Unfortunatelly, neither of the two vehicles was submitted to the European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) testing. This makes it virtually impossible for me to pick one over the other and I'm generally against buying such cars as the safety should really always come first. Still, apart from the official crash test results there are other things we need to be aware of. Both vehicles belong to the suv segment, which is generally a very good thing safety-wise, but it doesn't do much to help us decide between the two. Furthermore, when it comes to weight, a factor that most people underestimate, the Russian car offers a considerable difference of 19% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that Suzuki as a brand displays somewhat better results, at least on all of the models level. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of Lada with an average rating of 4.3, and models under the Suzuki badge with 4.5 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed Niva as average reliability-wise, and Jimny is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as the Russian car rank it on average as 4.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 5.0 out of 5.

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

Suzuki 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 Russian car offers significantly better overall protection, taking the lead here. 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 Lada. 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. I suggest you spend two more minutes in order to find out which car, based on your needs and budget, would be picked by the virtual adviser™, among more than 12.000 different ones in our database.