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 4-door sedan body style within the same 'Luxury car' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (rear for the Mercedes Benz and front in the case of the Citroen). The first one has a Mercedes Benz-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 8-cylinder, 32-valves 515hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 6-cylinder, 24-valves 215hp engine designed by Peugeot.

The fact that the Citroen got tested by the European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), while the other contender didn't, puts it sky-high safety-wise, in my eyes at least. Moving further on, let's take a closer look at some additional safety-related facts. Both vehicles belong to the luxury car segment, which is generally a very good thing safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? Furthermore, taking kerb weight as an important factor into account, the German car offers a marginal difference of 1% more metal.

Reliability is not the best thing to consider on the make level, but it is worth mentioning that Citroen does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of Mercedes Benz with an average rating of 4.3, and models under the Citroen badge with 4.0 out of 5. Independent research findings rank CLS as average reliability-wise, and C6 is more or less at the same level.That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as the German car rank it on average as 3.0 out of 5, exactly the same as the other one.

Mercedes Benz is way more agile, reaching 100km/h in 4.9 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 250 kilometers per hour, 20km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be the French car, averaging around 11.2 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (25 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 29% difference compared to the German car!

Citroen 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 French car beats the other contender by far, making it the best choice without even considering other things. From there things take a different direction, with Mercedes Benz outracing its opponent in any situation possible, making it better choice for boy racers. It does come at a cost though, and that's the fuel consumption... All together, there's not much more to say, in this case I wouldn't even consider anything but Citroen. 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.