Japan is preparing to remove one of the main administrative obstacles for unmanned transport. According to Nikkei, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT) is considering unified requirements for vehicles of level 4 and above that have neither a steering wheel nor pedals, and intends to apply them from December 2026. For now this is a plan rather than an active regulation: it concerns a revision of safety standards, and whether the changes will take effect on schedule will become clear in the near future.
Until now, each such vehicle was inspected individually, and every decision turned into a separate procedure. The new approach replaces one-off permits with a unified assessment procedure. This concerns transport that handles movement on its own in specified conditions: from robotaxis to small shuttles. The key difference of level 4 is that within a designated zone and mode a human driver is not needed at all, and the system bears responsibility for movement.
Japan does not need to start from scratch. In the village of Eiheiji in Fukui Prefecture, the country's first level 4 service began operating in May 2023 on a two-kilometer route, and the speed of the seven-seat vehicles did not exceed 12 km/h. In the city of Hitachi in Ibaraki Prefecture, a level 4 bus was launched in fiscal 2024, but with an operator on board. The legal basis was provided by an amendment to the Road Traffic Act that took effect in April 2023: it introduced a permitting system, and such permits are issued by regional public safety commissions. The government set a goal of 50 locations with autonomous services by fiscal 2025, but as of June 2026, according to MLIT data, 11 such locations were actually in operation. The gap between plans and practice is precisely what explains why the state is now betting on standardized certification.
The most notable project is the joint effort by Toyota and Waymo, announced on 30 October 2026. Toyota will build robotaxis based on the bZ4X electric crossover at its Takaoka plant in Aichi Prefecture, and Waymo's hardware will be integrated right on the assembly line. Testing and verification in Japan are planned to begin in 2027, while the companies have not yet set a date for commercial launch. Separately, Waymo announced its intention to open rides to the public in Tokyo in 2027, and a pilot with the Jaguar I-PACE continues in the city in parallel. In our assessment, this is precisely where the connection to the new rules becomes apparent: factory assembly of production vehicles makes economic sense only when certification becomes unified rather than one-off.
Japanese norms do not exist apart from the global agenda. In March 2023, an MLIT representative became the first non-European to hold the post of vice-chair of WP.29 — the UN working forum that develops rules for vehicles. In 2026, WP.29 adopted the first-ever global framework that legally permits fully autonomous driving systems. Japanese authorities transpose the international WP.29 rules into their own legislation, so the domestic reform and global standards are moving in the same direction.
Why is Japan in such a hurry? Here the economics matter more than romance. According to one analyst surveyed by Bloomberg, it is more profitable to sell level 4 as a service rather than as a personal vehicle: the manufacturer earns from fleet operation rather than from a one-time sale. A McKinsey estimate cited by Bloomberg suggests that the market for such vehicles could reach 400 billion dollars by 2035. For Japanese cities with dense development and narrow streets, this means not only fewer parking spaces in the long run, but also new requirements for road infrastructure and markings.
The main question remains open: how much time it will take for level 4 zones to extend beyond individual villages and test routes, and how quickly regulators in other countries will adapt their own norms to vehicles without traditional controls. The Japanese example shows that certification can become not a barrier but a lever — if the rules are unified and clear to manufacturers in advance.
