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 small family car segment and utilize the same 5-door wagon body style and the front wheel drive system, it all comes up to the specific diesel engine choice they offer. The first one has a Opel-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 82hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 80hp engine designed by Renault.

A starting point here would be to take a look at the results from European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP) tests which were performed on both of the cars, 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 small family car segment, which is generally classifying them somewhere in the middle safety-wise, but that fact doesn't break the tie between the two cars. Furthermore, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, the German car offers a marginal difference of 3% more metal.

Reliability is not the best thing to consider on the make level, but it is worth mentioning that Renault does have a slight advantage, when all the models are taken into account. That's the official data, while our visitors describe reliability of Opel, as well as Renault, with the same average rating of 4.2 out of 5. The same official information place Astra as average reliability-wise, and Megane 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 4.0, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 3.8 out of 5.

Both of the cars accelerate exactly the same, so we couldn't put one above the other. Car No. 1 reaches top speed of 168 kilometers per hour, exactly the same as the other car does. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be the German car, averaging around 4.8 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (59 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 17% difference compared to the French car.

Renault 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. When it comes to performance, both vehicles provide similar experience, so I wouldn't point any of them out. the German car , on the other hand, consumps significantly less fuel, and that's a big plus. All together, there's not much more to say, in this case I wouldn't even consider anything but Opel. 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.