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 5-door suv body style and the 4 x 4 wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific diesel engine choice they offer. The first one has a Mitsubishi-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 200hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 158hp engine designed by Nissan.

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 suv segment, which is generally a very good thing safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? On the other hand, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, Patrol offers a marginal difference of 3% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that Nissan does have a slight advantage, at least on all of the models level. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of Mitsubishi with an average rating of 4.6, and models under the Nissan badge with 4.3 out of 5. Some independent research have also placed Pajero as average reliability-wise, and Patrol is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as Pajero rank it on average as 4.5, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 5.0 out of 5.

Mitsubishi is way more agile, reaching 100km/h in 4.1 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 180 kilometers per hour, 20km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy an obvious choice would be Pajero, averaging around 8.3 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (34 mpg), in combined cycle. That's 30% difference compared to Patrol!

Nissan 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, Patrol offers slightly better overall protection and takes the lead. From there things take a different direction, with Mitsubishi outracing its opponent in any situation possible, making it better choice for boy racers. 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 Mitsubishi. 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 thousands of similar, yet so different vehicles.