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 Crown are reminded to check the back seat if they opened the rear door before starting out. The A4 doesn’t offer a back seat reminder.
Over 200 people are killed each year when backed over by motor vehicles. The Crown Limited/Platinum has standard Automatic Braking that uses rear sensors to monitor and automatically apply the brakes to prevent a rear collision. The A4 doesn’t offer backup collision prevention brakes.
The Crown has a standard blind spot warning system which uses sensors to alert the driver to objects in the vehicle’s blind spots where the side view mirrors don’t reveal them. A system to reveal vehicles in the A4’s blind spot costs extra.
To help make backing out of a parking space safer, the Crown has a standard rear cross-path warning system, which uses sensors in the rear bumper to alert the driver to vehicles approaching from the side, helping the driver avoid collisions. Rear cross-path warning costs extra on the A4.
Both the Crown and the A4 have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front side-impact airbags, driver and front passenger knee airbags, side-impact head airbags, four-wheel antilock brakes, all wheel drive, traction control, electronic stability systems to prevent skidding, crash mitigating brakes, daytime running lights, lane departure warning systems, rearview cameras and available around view monitors.
The Toyota Crown weighs 623 to 889 pounds more than the Audi A4. The NHTSA advises that heavier cars are much safer in collisions than their significantly lighter counterparts.