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Virtual Adviser's™ opinion
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 city car segment and utilize the same 3-door hatchback body style and the front wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific petrol engine choice they offer. The first one has a Nissan-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 3-cylinder, 12-valves 80hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 75hp engine designed by Volkswagen.
SafetyBoth 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 city car segment, which is generally not a very good thing safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? On the other hand, when it comes to weight, a factor that most people underestimate, the German car offers a considerable difference of 26% more metal.
ReliabilityManufacturers 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 Nissan with an average rating of 4.3, and models under the Volkswagen badge with 4.2 out of 5. Unfortunatelly, I don't have enough insight that would allow me to comment in more details on the specific models level. We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as the Japanese car rank it on average as 4.3, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.2 out of 5.
Performance & Fuel economyNissan is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.7 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 167 kilometers per hour, 6km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the Japanese car, averaging around 5.9 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (48 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 20% difference compared to the German car.
Verdict
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, the German car offers significantly better overall protection, taking the lead here. From there things take a different direction, with Nissan offering somewhat better performance, just enough to call it quicker. To make things even better, it consumps less fuel! I believe that, when we take all into account, we have only one winner here - the Nissan. 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.