Volkswagen Passat or Ford Mondeo?

Volkswagen Passat or Ford Mondeo? I am trying to decide whether to buy a 2011 Volkswagen Passat TDI 1.6 CL or a 2010 Ford Mondeo Titanium 2.0 TDCi. Both have similar mileage in the region of 35,000. I am looking for a familiy car with reliability, fuel efficency and good resale.

Martina Phelan (Kilkenny)

Sep 2013 Filed under: choosing used car

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Expert answer

Hi Martina,

Both cars you've chosen there are pretty much neck and neck in every area, bar one. The Passat is arguably a little more 'premium' in its feel, the Mondeo is better to drive and we'd say a touch better looking (though obviously that's subjective!).

Both are impressively well built and have excellent reliability credentials. The area that separates them is quite simply fuel consumption. The Mondoe's 2.0 TDCi engine will be a bit more usefully grunty than that Passat's 105hp 1.6 TDI unit, but the Volkswagen's engine will prove to be a lot more economical. You should be able to average close to 60mpg in the Passat, which should be around 5-10mpg better than the Mondeo will manage. To illustrate it, we once managed to drive from Galway to Glasgow, back to Galway and up to Dublin on one tank in a Passat 1.6 TDI.

Neil Briscoe - Complete Car Adviser
@neilmbriscoe