Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 213a; Child Restraint Systems-Side Impact Protection; Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 213; Child Restraint Systems, Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. 213b; Child Restraint Systems; Incorporation by Reference
Key claim: NHTSA is delaying the child car-seat side-impact crash-test deadline to December 5, 2026, exempting school-bus child restraints from those tests and from vehicle-anchor attachment rules if they are labeled as specified, and stopping use of the 12-month-old crash dummy to test forward-facing seats.
Abstract
(Rule · Transportation Department, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) This final rule amends the safety standards for child restraint systems (CRSs). NHTSA is amending Federal motor vehicle safety standard (FMVSS) No. 213a, “Child restraint systems–side impact protection,” to exempt school bus CRSs from the standard’s requirements as long as they meet specified labeling requirements; to delay the compliance date from June 30, 2025 to December 5, 2026; to amend the dummy selection requirements so that the Child Restraint Air Bag Interaction twelve-month-old test dummy (CRABI-12MO) will not be used to test forward-facing CRSs; and to amend positioning procedures for that dummy. The first two of these amendments are in response to petitions from CRS manufacturers. NHTSA is also amending FMVSS No. 213, “Child restraint systems” and FMVSS No. 213b, “Child restraint systems; Mandatory applicability beginning December 5, 2026,” to exclude school bus CRSs from the requirements to provide attachments for connection to the vehicle’s child restraint anchorage system and to change certain labeling requirements to reflect how school bus child restraints are used.
Why this matters
The side-impact test protocol in FMVSS 213a was one of the first federal child-seat rules aimed at side crashes, and its compliance deadline determines when new seats sold in the U.S. must meet it. Delaying to December 2026 gives manufacturers more time, while exempting school-bus restraints and dropping the 12-month dummy for forward-facing configurations narrows the test population. The practical safety effect on children in passenger vehicles is a longer wait for uniformly side-impact-tested seats.