For the older cars – I don’t know if this is true of the new cars – the European market cars are ‘better’ to the extent they had more powerful engines than the US market cars. European market cars also came with fewer automatic and powered devices such as window cranks and climate control. The European market cars therefore had fewer things to break compared to the US market cars 20 plus years down the road.

The European market cars also had the original design bumpers, headlights, headlight beam adjusts, caution triangle, fire extinguisher, and other cosmetic items that were either deleted on the US market cars or replaced with USDOT versions that detracted from the car’s looks.

Someone who knows the post ’91 cars can speak to the difference between the two, if any, but what I do know about today’s cars is that US market cars come with fewer engine choices. Many of the smaller displacement engines aren’t available here.