For enhanced safety, the front and middle seat shoulder belts of the Nissan Armada are height-adjustable to accommodate a wide variety of driver and passenger heights. A better fit can prevent injuries and the increased comfort also encourages passengers to buckle up. The Audi Q7 doesn’t offer height-adjustable middle seat belts.
In the past twenty years hundreds of infants and young children have died after being left in vehicles, usually by accident. When turning the vehicle off, drivers of the Armada are reminded to check the back seat if they opened the rear door before starting out. The Q7 doesn’t offer a back seat reminder.
The Armada has standard Active Head Restraints, which use a specially designed headrest to protect the driver and front passenger from whiplash. During a rear-end collision, the Active Head Restraints system moves the headrests forward to prevent neck and spine injuries. The Q7 doesn’t offer a whiplash protection system.
The Armada’s driver alert monitor detects an inattentive driver then sounds a warning and suggests a break. According to the NHTSA, drivers who fall asleep cause about 100,000 crashes and 1500 deaths a year. The Q7 doesn’t offer a driver alert monitor.
Both the Armada and the Q7 have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front side-impact airbags, side-impact head airbags, front seatbelt pretensioners, height adjustable front shoulder belts, four-wheel antilock brakes, traction control, electronic stability systems to prevent skidding, crash mitigating brakes, daytime running lights, lane departure warning systems, blind spot warning systems, rearview cameras, rear cross-path warning, available all wheel drive and around view monitors.
The Nissan Armada weighs 568 to 1250 pounds more than the Audi Q7. The NHTSA advises that heavier vehicles are much safer in collisions than their significantly lighter counterparts.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration does side impact tests on new vehicles. In this test, which crashes the vehicle into a flat barrier at 38.5 MPH and into a post at 20 MPH, results indicate that the Nissan Armada is safer than the Audi Q7:
|
Armada |
Q7 |
|
Front Seat |
|
STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
HIC |
27 |
187 |
Abdominal Force |
81 G’s |
128 G’s |
Hip Force |
144 lbs. |
350 lbs. |
|
Rear Seat |
|
STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
HIC |
31 |
337 |
Spine Acceleration |
21 G’s |
62 G’s |
Hip Force |
151 lbs. |
888 lbs. |
|
Into Pole |
|
STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
Spine Acceleration |
39 G’s |
40 G’s |
New test not comparable to pre-2011 test results. More stars = Better. Lower test results = Better.