Audi A3 > VW Golf > Seat Leon > Skoda Octavia

  • Thread starter Thread starter Ed
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Jono said:
Only applicable for the Mk1 leon.
The MK2's interior is pretty poor, in comparison.
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Pretty confident that by saying MK1 I was referring to the MK1.

The MK2 Leon I despise, having driven the new Cupra, I found it to be pretty poor, in both quality, style, and worst of all, driving position/feel.
 
I'm not sure if its true anymore but in Audi's an VW's you get little things / finishing touches that you don't get on a similar model (at a cheaper price) Skodas, for example on my car things like puddle lights / lights in the dashboard vents are standard, unless you buy a top end skoda superb you don't get these.

Build quailty in the new A3 is better than the skodas, no doubt you do pay extra for the badge but thats not the entire cost difference.
 
I think the difference really shines when you start getting up to the A4, A6 etc etc.

The A3 (especially in MK1 guise) wasn't a superbly high quality car, and as such it wasn't really feasible to make the "cheaper" brands to be that much different quality wise.

As Firestar says, this has changed with the new generation A3 however.
 
I especially like the finishing touches on my VW Passat.

Like the way half a pint of water drops into my shoes when I open the door after a night's rain. I'm especially fond of that one. It's a very close call between than and the constant squeeking from the glovebox mechanism.

Then again, there's always the feature where the door won't stay open if you're parked on a 4 degree incline and subsequently 60 kilos of NCAP padding crushes your leg.
 
merlin said:
I especially like the finishing touches on my VW Passat.

Like the way half a pint of water drops into my shoes when I open the door after a night's rain. I'm especially fond of that one. It's a very close call between than and the constant squeeking from the glovebox mechanism.

Then again, there's always the feature where the door won't stay open if you're parked on a 4 degree incline and subsequently 60 kilos of NCAP padding crushes your leg.
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Perhaps you should upgrade to an A4.
 
markyp23 said:
This is ridiculous. You have never been in a Seat Leon yet you would place it above the a Golf. It's OK to say that you don't know enough about them to place them...no one would judge you.

What do the Skoda Octavia and Audi A3 have that the Leon and Golf don't? Most people say Audi is a prestige marque but Skoda? It really doesn't have much going for it other than the price and that doesn't exactly make it better.

"Which is better? Tesco Value toilet roll or Andrex? Well... Tesco one is cheaper."
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As I said.
If people want to live 10 years in the past when Skoda were not part of VAG and all the jokes were around then so be it.
The Skoda has got lots going for it - the price just makes the package even better.
The engines are the same, the floor pans are the same.
Sure the bodywork is different.
But you take an A3 and equally specified Octavia and you'll save a lot on the Octavia.
The vehicles are equally "pretty", equally reliable and I would say of pretty similar build quality.

If you're buying for the badge then you won't consider a Skoda - you're loss.
But if you're buying for the badge you also shouldn't be considering the Seat - 10 years ago they had equally bad press as Skoda.

As for my rankings - I think I made it pretty clear why I rated them in the order I did.
The VW dropped to bottom because I don't like the styling, I wasn't over impressed the last time I drove one and the price makes me feel that you don't get the best value.
Because it dropped to the bottom this meant that by default the Seat rose above it.
 
stoofa said:
But if you're buying for the badge you also shouldn't be considering the Seat - 10 years ago they had equally bad press as Skoda.
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Not quite. Until 10 years ago, they essentially did carbon copies of FIAT's offerings. So whilst they weren't stylish, or luxurious, they were cheap utilitarian transport.

Not a gleaming reputation by a long shot, but certainly nowhere near as "tainted" as Skoda's.
 
equally pretty? skodas are hideously ugly compared to the other 3 brands, especially that front grille. But I guess looks are subjective, some people think Skodas are ugly and then some people are wrong.
 
This is insightful considering they're all meant to be the same, particularly the last statement.

Comparisons

The German automobile TV show Auto, Motor und Sport compared the Škoda Octavia with its cousin, the Volkswagen Golf Mk5 and concluded that the Škoda Octavia was slightly better than the Volkswagen Golf owing to a little more interior space and other specific ergonomics, better build quality, better driveability and a lower price.

The British automobile magazine and TV/radio show Top Gear in their 2006 survey placed the first generation Octavia into 3rd place and was described as a masterpiece of dependability.[5] The second generation was too new to be included in the survey.

The British automobile magazine Auto Express awarded to the second generation Octavia the gold medal in their prestigious Driver Power top 100, stating that it is "the UK'’s most satisfying car to own in 2007" and that it "has bettered every other car on sale in the UK".[6]

Along with other Škodas, the Czech-built Octavia has been a markedly reliable vehicle, more so than the Audi A3 and Volkswagen Golf with which it shares platforms. In 2006 Warranty Direct, a UK-based provider of mechanical warranties for used cars, rated Škoda the top manufacturer (above Mazda and Honda), while Audi came seventh from bottom. The Octavia specifically had a reliability index of 32.74 (lower being more reliable) while the Golf produced over the same period was 87.28 and the Audi A3 99.43.
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First two quotes mean what really, the octavia is bigger inside, so what its a stretched golf platform so erm...

Bettered everyother car in the UK, in what, i bet a Bently is better to own

last one is BS, take the normal skoda owner and normal Audi owner, now who is going to complain about every last thing and who is going to let stuff slide...........

I'm not 100% sure on the direction of this thread tbh, are you trying to say skoda are the best in the group or what?
 
Firestar_3x said:
I'm not 100% sure on the direction of this thread tbh, are you trying to say skoda are the best in the group or what?
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No, not at all. The idea of the thread is to get peoples opinions on whether the A3, Golf, Leon and Octavia are in fact the same car or whether, using the same platform and engines, there's enough variation in the way the cars are put together to call them different.

Different looks, both inside and out are easy to obtain but when reliability, performance and handling are different, you have to ask, how similar are these cars?
 
Can we clarify something.

Are you soley talking about the MK1 A3, MK1 Leon, Mk1 Octavia and MK4 Golf? Or are you comparing them now?

If you were talking about the MK1's and MK4 golf then like for like (say a 1.6 basic spec Golf, Leon and A3), they will all handle pretty much similar. Slight differences due to weight variations will be prevalent, but other than that, they will be THE SAME. With the octavia, due to it being a lengthened chassis, it will handle differently.

If you are talking the new generation of cars from all manufacturers, the differences are wider, and the brand differentiation is more obvious.
 
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