New safety requirements for cars and vans have entered into force across the EU, bringing more advanced technologies into newly registered vehicles.

Since 2024, the EU’s General Safety Regulation has made a range of safety systems mandatory for new cars and vans. From 7 July 2026, additional requirements now apply, including advanced emergency braking capable of detecting pedestrians and cyclists, improved driver-distraction monitoring, enhanced forward vision, new tests for worn tyres and an expanded safety glass area to better protect pedestrians.

The measures are part of the EU’s wider ambition to reduce deaths and serious injuries on European roads and move as close as possible to zero fatalities by 2050 – Vision Zero.

The new requirements highlight the increasingly important role of technology in creating a safer transport system. By helping vehicles detect hazards, support drivers and better protect vulnerable road users, advanced safety systems can help address some of the risks associated with human error.

This principle is also central to the Safe System approach, which recognises that people will make mistakes and that the transport system should be designed so that these mistakes do not result in death or serious injury.

For EvoRoads, the new vehicle requirements provide another example of how road safety increasingly depends on interaction between vehicles, infrastructure, technology and road users. The project is exploring this holistic approach developing and testing solutions that can help identify risks, improve infrastructure safety and support safer mobility.

As increasingly advanced vehicle technologies become part of everyday mobility, connecting these capabilities with safer infrastructure and better road-safety data will be important to achieving a truly integrated Safe System.