NHTSA publishes interim Part 555 guidance and opens comments through August 31
The notice sets out enhanced application instructions for automated-driving exemptions and discloses 517 alleged ADS crashes and 787 alleged Level 2 crashes reported from June to December 2025.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration published updates to its automated vehicle framework on July 31, together with an interim guidance document titled Interim Part 555 Guidance and Enhanced Application Instructions. Comments are due on or before August 31.
The guidance includes a section on the information the agency finds useful when reviewing exemption applications for vehicles equipped with automated driving systems. The notice also consolidates changes made since April 2025: the Automated Vehicle Exemption Program was widened from imported vehicles to domestically manufactured ones, and Part 555 decisions moved to operational authorizations issued alongside the grant notice. Between 2016 and 2025 the agency processed special exemptions covering more than 460 imported automated vehicles across more than 360 projects in 31 states.
The notice also reports crash data collected under the third amended standing general order. Between June and December 2025, manufacturers reported 517 alleged crashes involving automated driving systems and 787 alleged crashes involving Level 2 driver assistance. The agency said those reports contributed to seven formal investigations and seven recalls.
This is the written instrument behind the fast-track announcement the agency made earlier in the week, and it arrived the same day as the Zoox exemption grant. What it adds is the procedure: a documented application standard, a comment period, and a stated evidentiary basis drawn from reported crashes.