For enhanced safety, the front seat shoulder belts of the Volvo XC60 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 Mercedes GLA doesn’t offer height-adjustable seat belts.
Both the XC60 and GLA have child safety locks to prevent children from opening the rear doors. The XC60 Plus/Ultra/Polestar has power child safety locks, allowing the driver to activate and deactivate them from the driver's seat and to know when they're engaged. The GLA’s child locks have to be individually engaged at each rear door with a manual switch. The driver can’t know the status of the locks without opening the doors and checking them.
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 XC60 are reminded to check the back seat if they opened the rear door before starting out. The GLA doesn’t offer a back seat reminder.
The Volvo XC60 offers optional built in child booster seats. They’re more crash worthy than an added child seat because of their direct attachment to the seat. Mercedes doesn’t offer the convenience and security of a built-in child booster seat in the GLA. Their owners must carry a heavy booster seat in and out of the vehicle; XC60 owners can just fold their built-in child seat up or down.
Using vehicle speed sensors and seat sensors, smart airbags in the XC60 deploy with different levels of force or don’t deploy at all to help better protect passengers of all sizes in different collisions. The XC60’s side airbags will shut off if a child is leaning against the door. The GLA’s side airbags don’t have smart features and will always deploy full force.
Over 200 people are killed each year when backed over by motor vehicles. The XC60 has standard CTA Auto Brake that uses rear sensors to monitor for objects to the rear and automatically applies the brakes to prevent a collision. The GLA doesn’t offer automatic braking for stationary objects directly to the rear.
To provide maximum traction and stability on all roads, All-Wheel Drive is standard on the XC60. But it costs extra on the GLA.
The XC60’s standard lane departure warning system alerts a temporarily inattentive driver when the vehicle begins to leave its lane and gently nudges the vehicle back towards its lane. A lane departure warning system costs extra on the GLA.
Both the XC60 and the GLA have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front side-impact airbags, driver knee airbags, side-impact head airbags, front and rear seatbelt pretensioners, four-wheel antilock brakes, traction control, electronic stability systems to prevent skidding, crash mitigating brakes, daytime running lights, blind spot warning systems, rearview cameras, rear cross-path warning, driver alert monitors and available around view monitors.
The Volvo XC60 weighs 668 to 1368 pounds more than the Mercedes GLA. The NHTSA advises that heavier vehicles are much safer in collisions than their significantly lighter counterparts.