Comparisons

What a comparison here is

Each page takes two cars and puts their figures next to each other from the specification pages underneath: dimensions, weight, power, torque, economy, and where a brochure supplies it, acceleration and top speed. Both columns come from the same sources measured the same way, which sounds obvious and is exactly what most comparisons get wrong — a manufacturer’s claimed 0–60 against an independently tested one is not a comparison, it is two different measurements in the same table.

Where the difference between two cars is genuinely small, the page says so. A pair whose weights differ by forty pounds are, for practical purposes, the same weight, and dressing that up as an advantage would be dishonest.

Why these are all BMW against BMW

Because that is what our data can support, and the limit is worth stating plainly rather than working around.

This site holds detailed records for BMW: 2,490 specification pages built from government filings and cross-checked against factory brochures we hold and can quote. For Audi, Mercedes, Tesla, Porsche and the rest we hold nothing of the kind. We could pull competitor numbers off manufacturer websites and present them alongside ours, and it would look the same to a reader — but the two columns would no longer be comparable, and the whole point of the exercise would be gone.

Cross-brand comparisons are planned, and they will be built the honest way when they arrive: on the rows both sides genuinely share — the EPA’s own figures for economy, emissions and vehicle class, which are measured by the same agency under the same test for every car sold in the United States — with the rows we cannot fill left visibly empty rather than plausibly guessed.

The comparisons that are most useful

The BMW-against-BMW ones are not a consolation prize. They answer the question people actually get stuck on, which is rarely “BMW or Audi” and much more often “which BMW”.

• X3 vs X5 and X1 vs X3 — the steps up the SUV range, where the price gap looks larger than the size gap until you see the dimensions.
• X5 vs X6 and X4 vs X6 — what the sloping roof actually costs in practical terms.
• 330i vs M340i — the four against the six in the same body, which is the clearest illustration of what an engine upgrade is worth.
• M3 vs M4 and M2 vs M4 — cars that share an engine and differ in ways the badge does not explain.
• 3 Series vs 5 Series — the oldest question in the range.

A comparison is not a recommendation

Nothing on these pages is sponsored, and no manufacturer or dealer has paid to appear in one. Nor do we score cars: a page tells you an X6 gives up cargo space to an X5 and leaves you to decide whether you mind, because whether you mind is not something a specification table knows.

Figures are for United States market cars in the model years we hold records for. A version sold elsewhere may differ in power, equipment and weight, sometimes substantially. If you are comparing two specific cars rather than two models, go to their specification pages by model year — the differences between years within one generation are often larger than the differences between the two models you started with.