Brake pads OEM Volkswagen or OEM Mercedes

If you get a mk7, get the lighting and performance pack. The headlight performance is astonishing. The performance pack brakes are amazing not to mention how sweet the diff is on a back road.

Same, with a 2015 on stage 2 tune it can be pretty quick and on road trips with the cruise set to 70 it can pull some pretty fantastic fuel economy.

Mercedes has always had great brakes but until the 190E you didn't have many cheap upgrade options. I have E420 brakes on my 190E Sportline, and my god the stopping power is exceptional.

The brakes are a bit touchy at first. However as time goes on and they bed in they seem to be better. They are very well suited to back roads/canyon carving.

well except brake pads that need replacing.

My brakes are also "grabbier" and harder to modulate than my '16 GTI (312mm), which had great brake feel.

Yep... had that happen with my GLI. Stg 1 A6 GLI and the brakes really couldn't keep up w/the car. Upgraded them to A6 Golf R fronts and no problem now stopping.

The EXACT same on my trend line 2018 Golf. Just a further note. When we brought it in so they could look at the brakes due to our complaint, there was black ‘goop’ all over the rest of the rear suspension of the golf. The service manage could only theorize that the brake pads ‘melted’ and basically sprayed the wheel well... on BOTH rear wheels.

Here is a shot of the front brakes. They're quite worn, below the legal acceptable thickness for a Phaeton and showing hairline cracks on the inside, the pads are also fairly shot.

Whenever I talk to people they don't say too much about reliability, but what they do say is how they hate the maintenance costs with VWs. $100+ oil changes, paying for maintenance items off warranty at dealer (brakes), etc.