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 4-door sedan 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 Renault-engineered powertrain under the hood, a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 80hp unit, while the other one gets its power and torque from a 4-cylinder, 8-valves 69hp engine designed by Peugeot.

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 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 small family car segment, which is generally classifying them somewhere in the middle safety-wise, still it doesn't help us solve our dilemma, does it? Furthermore, if we'd like to consider vehicle mass in this context too, which we definitely should, Megane offers a marginal difference of 4% more metal.

Reliability is not the best thing to consider on the make level, but it is worth mentioning that both brands display similar results in faults and breakdowns, at least on all of the models level. These are the results of an independent reasearch, while our visitors describe reliability of Renault with an average rating of 4.1, and models under the Peugeot badge with 4.3 out of 5. Independent research findings rank Megane as average reliability-wise, and 306 is more or less at the same level.That apart, owners of different cars powered by the same engine as Megane rank it on average as 3.8, while the one under the competitor's bonnet gets 3.7 out of 5.

Renault is way more agile, reaching 100km/h in 3.5 seconds less than its competitor. In addition to that it accelerates all the way to 171 kilometers per hour, 8km/h more than the other car. When it comes to fuel economy the winner has to be Megane, averaging around 5.5 liters of fuel per 100 kilometers (51 mpg), in combined cycle. We can't ignore that 13% difference compared to 306.

Peugeot 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, Megane offers much better overall protection, which launches it ahead of the other contender. It all continues in the same direction, with Renault 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 Renault. 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™, out of 12.000+ vehicles we currently have in our database.