This article presents a comparison for several test cases between the diffuse approximation method (DAM) and the control-volume finite element method (CVFEM) The diffuse approximation method is a relatively new numerical approach that does not need a finite-element mesh to solve fluid flow and heat transfer problems in complex geometries. It appears that the two methods provide similar accurate results. However, when some manipulations of the grids are needed during the calculation process, such as a local refinement, the use of a simple set of nodes appears to be less time consuming, as shown in the last example.