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 luxury car segment and utilize the same 5-door wagon body style and the rear wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific diesel engine choice they offer. The first one has a Mercedes Benz-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 204hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 218hp engine designed by BMW.

Both vehicles got tested by European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), with the same number of safety stars gained in the process. 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, Mercedes Benz E offers a marginal difference of 1% 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, at least on all of the models level. These are the official statistics, while our visitors describe reliability of Mercedes Benz with an average rating of 4.4, and models under the BMW badge with 4.2 out of 5. Independent research findings rank E as average reliability-wise, and 5 Series is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as Mercedes Benz E rank it on average as 4.8, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 3.2 out of 5.

BMW is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.6 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 236 kilometers per hour, 4km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy things look pretty much the same for both cars, averaging around 5.3 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (54 mpg), in combined cycle.

Mercedes Benz 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, Mercedes Benz E offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. From there things take a different direction, with BMW offering somewhat better performance, just enough to call it quicker. It does come at a cost though, and that's the fuel consumption... I believe that, when we take all into account, we have only one winner here - the Mercedes Benz. 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 more than 12.000 different ones in our database.