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 5-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 Renault-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 16-valves 75hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 3-cylinder, 12-valves 82hp engine designed by Peugeot.

Both vehicles got tested by European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), with the Renault being a slightly better choice apparently. Still, apart from the official crash test results there are other things we need to be aware of. Both vehicles belong to the city car segment, which is generally not a very good thing safety-wise, but it doesn't do much to help us decide between the two. Furthermore, when it comes to weight, a factor that most people underestimate, Clio offers a marginal difference of 3% more metal.

Manufacturers have been building their reliability reputation for decades now and, generally speaking, it appears that Renault does have a slight advantage, at least on all of the models level. These are the results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of Renault, as well as Citroen, with the same average rating of 4.1 out of 5. The same official information place Clio as average reliability-wise, and C3 is more or less at the same level.We should definitely mention that owners of cars with the same powertrain as Clio rank it on average as 4.4, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 4.2 out of 5.

Citroen is a bit more agile, reaching 100km/h in 0.3 seconds less than its competitor. Still, it lacks the power to win the top speed competition, topping at 163 kilometers per hour, 4km/h less than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be Citroen C3, averaging around 4.1 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (69 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 34% difference compared to Clio.

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, Clio offers much better overall protection, which launches it ahead of the other contender. From there things take a different direction, with Citroen offering somewhat better performance, just enough to call it quicker. To make things even better, it consumps less fuel! No mistake, whatever you decide here, but I'd still go for the Citroen. 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 more than 12.000 different ones in our database.