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 'Executive car' segment, the only major difference here really is their wheel drive configuration (4 x 4 for the Mercedes Benz and rear in the case of the Lexus). The first one has a Mercedes Benz-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 8-cylinder, 24-valves 306hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 8-cylinder, 32-valves 285hp engine designed by Toyota.

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. Moving further on, let's take a closer look at some additional safety-related facts. Both vehicles belong to the executive car segment, which is generally a fortune 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, the German car offers a marginal difference of 4% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that Lexus as a brand displays somewhat better results, all the models observed together. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of Mercedes Benz with an average rating of 4.4, and models under the Lexus badge with 4.9 out of 5. Unfortunatelly, I don't have enough insight that would allow me to comment in more details on the specific models level. Above it all, drivers of cars with the same engine as the German car rank it on average as 4.3, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 5.0 out of 5.

Lexus is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.2 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 250 kilometers per hour, exactly the same as the other car does. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the Japanese car, averaging around 11.4 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (25 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 13% difference compared to the German car.

Lexus 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 German car offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. From there things take a different direction, with Lexus offering somewhat better performance, just enough to call it quicker. To make things even better, it consumps less fuel! All together, there's not much more to say, in this case I wouldn't even consider anything but Lexus. 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.