ISO 26262 · Road vehicles — Functional safety
ISO 26262 certification consulting for vehicle electronics backed by a safety case that holds up.
Show your customers functional safety in the form they ask for: a certificate for a product, component, software tool or development process from an independent certification body, and the confirmation measures, such as the functional safety assessment, that each project's ASIL calls for. Sterling's expert and experienced consultants build the safety management system with your engineers, prepare the evidence and stay with you through the evaluation and after it, in 60+ countries. We ensure successful certification for our clients.
- Consulting, Effivity software, Sterling Academy access and internal auditor training, as applicable to your standard, under one all-inclusive proposal in one proposal
- A team of expert and experienced automotive functional safety consultants, advising on management systems across sectors and countries since 2003
- The Sterling Promise: 100% on-time completion, 100% success, 8,100+ client engagements. Sterling does not certify; the certification body or independent assessor evaluates and decides
8,100+ client engagements in 60+ countries.
ISO 26262 client experience
What it is
What is ISO 26262 and what is it used for?
ISO 26262 is the international series of standards for the functional safety of electrical and electronic (E/E) systems in series-production road vehicles. It deals with the harm a vehicle can do when safety-related electronics or software behave in a way nobody intended: a brake, steering, powertrain or battery controller that fails, or fails unnoticed. Developed by ISO technical committee 22, subcommittee 32, it adapts the IEC 61508 series to the needs of road vehicles, in twelve parts.
The series works as a safety lifecycle. The organisation sets up the conditions: a safety culture, rules and processes, managed competence and a quality system. Each development then defines the item, analyses its hazards, assigns an automotive safety integrity level (ASIL) to every safety goal and develops system, hardware and software with the rigour that ASIL demands; confirmation measures check the result and a safety case argues it. In a long supply chain much of that work is shared between customer and supplier, and the split has to be agreed in writing.
Current edition. ISO 26262:2018, the second edition, published in December 2018. It replaced the 2011 first edition, which covered only series-production passenger cars up to 3,500 kg, extended the scope to all series-production road vehicles except mopeds, and added Part 11 on semiconductors and Part 12 on motorcycles. A third edition is in preparation: work began in October 2024, and between 4 and 7 August 2026 ISO registered drafts of all twelve parts as Draft International Standards, with Part 3 retitled "Product development at the item level". No publication date has been announced; until then, implement and be assessed to the 2018 edition. ISO 26262 third edition: status and what to plan
Who it is for
Who needs ISO 26262 certification?
ISO 26262 reaches everyone who develops a safety-related E/E system, or part of one, for a series-production road vehicle: vehicle manufacturers, system suppliers, developers of electronics, software and semiconductors, and the vendors of their development tools. Each carries the part of the lifecycle it develops, so the first question is not "are we certified?" but "what does our customer need to see?": a product certificate, a certified development process, a functional safety assessment report, the work products agreed in a development interface agreement, or several of these. Organisations come to Sterling for ISO 26262 from four starting points:
- A vehicle manufacturer or Tier 1 has written ISO 26262 into the sourcing documents. The request names an ASIL, work products and an assessment. First pin down which item or element is meant, which parts of the lifecycle are yours and what evidence closes the question.
- Your products are moving from mechanics into electronics and software. Electrification, driver assistance and software-defined functions bring suppliers into safety-related E/E work for the first time. The quality system exists; the safety lifecycle does not.
- You sell components, chips, software or tools into many vehicle programmes. Developed as a safety element out of context and, where customers want it, certified as a product, one development serves every programme that integrates it.
- An audit, an assessment or a field issue has exposed the gaps. Reviews were missing, the hazard analysis predates the design, safety anomalies live in e-mail, or a certificate does not cover the version you ship. The process needs rebuilding around how your projects really run.
Whatever the outcome, it depends on the lifecycle being lived in your projects, not on the document describing it.
Business benefits
How ISO 26262 protects your programmes and your customer relationships
Functional safety should make engineering more predictable, not slower. We start where a late hazard analysis, an unowned interface or a missing review would cost a sample phase, a start of production or a customer's confidence.
- Safety argued, not assertedA safety case linking every safety goal to the work products and confirmation results behind it, so a customer or assessor can follow the argument unaided.
- Fewer late surprisesHazard analysis, safety goals and ASIL decomposition settled before the architecture freezes, so safety mechanisms are designed in, not added after testing.
- Clear lines with customers and suppliersResponsibility for each work product agreed at the start of a distributed development, so nothing is done twice or falls between two companies.
- Reusable, certifiable building blocksElements developed once with their evidence and reused across programmes, with a qualification or proven-in-use argument where the standard allows one.
- Tools and versions you can defendSoftware tools evaluated and, where needed, qualified; change and configuration management keep the evidence aligned with the version that ships.
- Ready for the next requirementInterfaces to SOTIF, cybersecurity and process assessments and a route to the third edition, so a new customer requirement extends the system instead of starting another.
Track a few measures, such as review findings per project and safety anomalies past their due date. A thicker safety folder is not a result.
Requirements
What are the main ISO 26262 requirements?
ISO 26262 does not follow the clause 4 to 10 structure of ISO management system standards. Its twelve parts follow the safety lifecycle, and each scales its requirements to the ASIL: an ASIL D safety goal demands more methods, more independence and more evidence than an ASIL A goal. Read the table as a plain-language guide; the programme itself is checked against the text of each applicable part, one requirement at a time.
| Part | What it requires of you | What it looks like in practice |
|---|---|---|
| 2 Management of functional safety | For the organisation: safety culture, rules and processes, safety anomalies, competence and a quality management system; for each item: roles, impact analysis, tailoring, planning, the safety case, confirmation measures and release for production | A functional safety process set, a competence matrix, a safety anomaly log, planned safety activities per project, confirmation reports and a safety case at release |
| 3 Concept phase | Define the item, carry out the hazard analysis and risk assessment that derives safety goals and their ASILs, and specify the functional safety concept | An item definition with boundaries and interfaces, hazardous events rated for severity, exposure and controllability, safety goals with ASILs, and functional safety requirements allocated to the architecture |
| 4 Product development at the system level | Technical safety requirements, the technical safety concept, system architectural design, item integration and testing, and safety validation | System-level safety mechanisms, traceability from safety goals to architecture elements, integration test results and a validation report for the item in the vehicle |
| 5 Product development at the hardware level | Hardware safety requirements and design, evaluation of the hardware architectural metrics and of safety goal violations due to random hardware failures, and hardware integration and verification | Hardware safety analyses, metric and random-failure calculations against the targets for the ASIL, and verification records |
| 6 Product development at the software level | Software safety requirements, software architectural design, unit design and implementation, unit verification, integration and verification, and testing of the embedded software | A software architecture showing its safety mechanisms, and unit, integration and embedded-software test evidence using the methods the ASIL calls for |
| 7 Production, operation, service and decommissioning | Plan and control production, operation, service and decommissioning so the safety achieved in development is kept after release | Production controls for safety-related special characteristics, and operation, service and decommissioning instructions drawn from the development work products |
| 8 Supporting processes | Distributed developments, safety requirements, configuration and change management, verification, documentation, confidence in software tools, qualification of software components, evaluation of hardware elements, proven in use arguments, and systems not developed to ISO 26262 | An interface agreement with each customer and supplier, change requests with impact analysis, a tool register with confidence levels, and evaluations of reused components |
| 9 ASIL-oriented and safety-oriented analyses | Requirements decomposition with respect to ASIL tailoring, criteria for coexistence of elements, analysis of dependent failures, and safety analyses | Justified ASIL decompositions, coexistence arguments, dependent failure analyses, and FMEA and fault tree results fed back into the design |
| 1 · 10 · 11 · 12 Vocabulary, guidelines, semiconductors, motorcycles | Part 1 defines the terms; Parts 10 and 11 are informative guidance, the second for semiconductors; Part 12 adapts the series to motorcycles and supersedes the corresponding requirements for motorcycle items | One vocabulary along the supply chain, consistent interpretation and, for chip makers and motorcycle manufacturers, the part that shapes their programme |
What does useful ISO 26262 evidence look like?
For the organisation: the process set, competence records, the safety anomaly log and audit results. For each project: the item definition, the hazard analysis with safety goals and ASILs, the safety concepts, hardware metrics and safety analyses, verification results, tool confidence records, the interface agreements, confirmation reports and, at release, the safety case that ties them together. We help identify what each project needs at its ASIL, without documents for their own sake; the management records live in Effivity from the first workshop and point to the engineering artefacts in your tools.
The twelve parts of ISO 26262, explainedCertification process
How do you get ISO 26262 certified?
Decide first what is to be certified, because ISO 26262 offers no single company certificate. Certification bodies certify defined objects: a product or component, a software tool or a development process; TÜV Rheinland, for example, certifies processes after a pre-audit, document review and certification audit, followed by surveillance and recertification audits. Alongside any certificate, the standard calls for confirmation measures (confirmation reviews, a functional safety audit and a functional safety assessment) to the extent and independence each project's ASIL requires. Personnel certificates, such as TÜV SÜD's Functional Safety Certified Programme, TÜV Rheinland's FS Engineer or exida's CFSP and CFSE, attest a person's competence, not your product or process. Sterling prepares the process and the evidence; the certification body or independent assessor evaluates and decides.
- 01Decide what has to be shown, and to whom.The item or element and its version, the ASILs, the split of work with customer and suppliers, and whether the outcome is a certificate, an assessment report or both, from which body.
- 02Gap analysis: review your processes and a live project against the applicable parts.The gap analysis tests the organisation-level requirements and one project's work products, keeps what works and agrees actions, owners and dates.
- 03Build the safety management system and set up the projects.Processes, roles, competence criteria, tool rules and interface agreement templates, applied to each project from the item definition and hazard analysis onwards.
- 04Develop, verify and collect the work products.System, hardware and software work done with the methods the ASIL requires, and the safety case assembled as the project moves, not at the end.
- 05Confirm, then complete the independent evaluation.Confirmation reviews, functional safety audit and assessment by people with the required independence; then the certification body's evaluation, findings and decision.
- 06Maintain the certificate and the discipline.Impact analysis for every change, safety anomalies followed up, surveillance for a process certificate and re-evaluation when a certified product changes beyond its certificate.
Check the credibility of the route before comparing prices. Ask what the certificate will name, which edition it cites and who issues it, then verify the body's accreditation scope with the accreditation body and the certificate in the body's own register. A company-wide "ISO 26262 certificate" issued without anyone reading your work products is unlikely to satisfy a customer's functional safety audit, and the gaps stay yours. How to choose a credible ISO 26262 provider · The certification buyer's checklist
Cost
How much does ISO 26262 certification cost?
No universal price makes sense for ISO 26262. A software house certifying its development process needs a different scope from a Tier 1 taking an ASIL D braking controller to assessment, or a chip maker preparing a safety element out of context. What Sterling offers is an all-inclusive proposal that shows every component.
| Cost component | What affects it |
|---|---|
| Consulting and implementation | Your role, the parts and ASILs in scope, the number of projects and sites, the maturity of existing processes and work products, and how much of the work your team takes on (Design™ or Drive™) |
| Independent certification and assessment | The body's or assessor's fees: the object certified (product, tool or process), the ASIL, the volume of work products reviewed, any testing, and surveillance or re-evaluation |
| Engineering effort and internal resources | Safety analyses, verification, tool qualification and any redesign an analysis forces, usually the largest variable; plus engineering, quality and management time |
| Software and learning | Part of a Sterling engagement: Effivity for the safety management system and Sterling Academy access for your people, with users, courses and access period set out in the proposal |
| Continued support | Internal audits, support on new projects, refresher learning and the third edition under Sustain™ |
What moves the price
- The objects to be certified or assessed: product, component, tool or process
- The highest ASIL in scope and the number of items or elements
- How much of the lifecycle is yours and how much others carry
- What exists: IATF 16949, Automotive SPICE results, earlier safety work
- The customer milestone, and how much your engineers can carry
What a Sterling proposal always shows
- Deliverables, responsibilities, assumptions and exclusions, in writing
- Certification-body fees identified separately, so the full programme cost is comparable
- Effivity, training and Academy access itemised at no additional cost
- Payment milestones tied to deliverables, not to the calendar
- One all-inclusive proposal. No surprises, ever
Timeline
How long does ISO 26262 certification take?
It depends on what is being certified and where you start. A supplier's functional safety management system, with a first project run through it, realistically takes six to twelve months: the processes must run long enough to produce reviewed work products, an internal audit and the confirmation measures an evaluator will ask for. A product certificate follows the development project, whose work products are its evidence, so the programme's milestones set its date. We plan around that evidence, with milestones tracked in Effivity.
| Phase | What determines the pace |
|---|---|
| Scope and gap analysis | Access to engineers, process owners, existing work products and customer requirements |
| Process build and project set-up | The extent of process change, approvals and training, and when the first project starts under the new process |
| Work products and analyses | Engineering capacity, the ASILs involved, and the time analyses, verification and tool qualification take |
| Confirmation and internal review | Reviewers with the required independence, the functional safety audit and assessment, and management review |
| Independent evaluation | The body's or assessor's schedule, the volume of evidence and the time to close findings |
If a sample phase, supplier audit or start of production is fixed, share it at the start. We will say what is achievable by then and which decisions, such as an ASIL decomposition, cannot wait. A certificate date promised before anyone has read your hazard analysis is not a plan; it is a sales pitch.
Challenges
Common ISO 26262 implementation challenges
ISO 26262 programmes tend to stall in the same five places. Each has a practical answer.
Safety work runs behind the engineering.
The hazard analysis arrives after the architecture is fixed and the safety case is written at the end. We tie the safety activities to your project gates, so each design decision is taken with its safety goal and ASIL in view.
Customers and suppliers disagree about who owns which work product.
Agree the split at the start of every distributed development, work product by work product, including who performs which confirmation measure and how evidence is exchanged, and revisit it when the scope changes.
Tools, legacy software and bought-in parts were never developed to ISO 26262.
Part 8 offers routes: tool confidence, qualification of software components, evaluation of hardware elements, proven in use arguments and integration of systems not developed to the standard. We choose one per element and record why.
The independence rules stretch a small team.
Confirmation measures need people independent of the work, to the degree the ASIL requires. We help you plan reviewers from other teams or an external assessor early, and we never assess work we helped to produce.
Safety, SOTIF, cybersecurity and process assessments run as four separate programmes.
ISO 21448 leaves faults to ISO 26262, and ISO 26262-2 gives guidance on the interaction with cybersecurity. One development process with clear interfaces lets the same reviews, change control and evidence serve every assessment.
Your engagement
What your ISO 26262 engagement includes
Others sell a hazard analysis or a process manual and leave the rest to you. A Sterling engagement covers the whole route to a working safety management system and a prepared engineering team, from one team, for one all-inclusive proposal.
Scope, gap analysis and implementation plan
Your role in the supply chain, the parts and ASILs in scope and your customers' requirements, with owners, dates and decisions agreed before work starts.
Safety management system and project work products
Processes, roles, competence criteria, tool rules and interface agreement templates written with your engineers and applied to your projects.
Effivity ISO & GRC software
Your functional safety management runs in Effivity from the first week, included with the engagement at no additional cost.
Training for everyone
Internal auditor training for your audit team, as applicable to your standard, and preferential Sterling Academy access, including complimentary awareness training for your people as part of the engagement.
Internal audit and preparation for confirmation
Internal audits of your safety processes as agreed, and the functional safety audit and assessment prepared with suitably independent reviewers, findings closed before the evaluator arrives.
Certification and assessment readiness
Preparation for the certification body's evaluation or your customer's assessment, help with findings, and support until the certificate or report is issued.
Certification decisions remain with the independent certification body.
How we deliver
How Sterling supports your ISO 26262 implementation
Every ISO 26262 engagement runs on Sterling OS™, our delivery operating system: five phases, each with defined deliverables, decision owners and evidence. You choose how much support your engineering capacity needs; method, software and accountability do not change with it.
- 01Design™Guided implementation: your engineers build the processes and work products with Sterling's structure, workshops and coaching.
- 02Drive™Fully managed consulting: Sterling consultants carry the agreed work alongside your project leads and process owners.
- 03Sustain™After certification: support on new projects, internal audits, surveillance preparation, refreshers and training for new engineers, year after year.
- 04Automate™The safety management system running in Effivity: processes, competence, project safety activities, anomalies, audits, actions and management review in one workspace.
- 05Revise™The third edition of ISO 26262 once it is published, new customer requirements, and changes in products, sites or scope.
In the first week we name the engagement team, set a weekly working session and agree deliverables and decision owners. Progress is reviewed against those commitments throughout, so a gap surfaces in a project review, not in front of the assessor.
How Sterling OS™ worksOften combined with
Standards organisations pair with ISO 26262
- AIAG core toolsAutomotive core tools implementation and training: APQP, Control Plan, PPAP, FMEA, MSA and SPC applied on your live parts.
- AQAP 2110AQAP 2110 compliance for defence suppliers: what the NATO contract requirement covers, AQAP 2105 quality plans, government quality assurance and an all-inclusive proposal.
- AS9100AS9100 certification consulting for aerospace and defence suppliers: ISO 9001 plus product safety, configuration and FAI, ready for an IAQG scheme audit.
- AS9110AS9110 certification for aviation maintenance organisations: the 9110 requirements, the IAQG audit route, cost and timeline factors, and Sterling's support.
- AS9120AS9120 certification for aerospace distributors and stockists: requirements, the IAQG audit route, OASIS listing, cost and timeline factors, with Sterling.
- CE markingCE marking compliance support for manufacturers: EU rules, technical files, declaration of conformity and quality systems.
Effivity · ISO 26262 safety management workspace, included in every engagement
How Effivity helps you fulfil, automate and simplify the requirements of ISO 26262:2018.
Every Sterling ISO 26262 engagement includes Effivity, the ISO and GRC automation platform built by the Sterling group and used in 50+ countries. On its no-code platform your consultant configures, within the agreed scope, a workspace for the management side of functional safety: processes, competence, planned safety activities, interface agreements, the tool register, safety anomalies, confirmation records, audits and management review. Engineering artefacts stay in your development tools; Effivity holds the system around them. Sterling consulting clients get their Effivity subscription included with the engagement, at no additional cost.
Safety culture, processes and competence
The functional safety policy, the process set, roles and the competence each needs, with training records per engineer, reviewed on a schedule rather than before an audit.
Safety activities per project
For every item, planned safety activities with owners and dates, tailoring decisions and their rationale, lifecycle progress and the index of work products the safety case cites.
Hazards, safety goals and ASILs
Hazardous events with severity, exposure and controllability ratings, the resulting safety goals and ASILs, and review dates, linked to the functional safety concept.
Customers, suppliers and interface agreements
Supplier selection records, the interface agreement for each distributed development, responsibilities per work product and the evidence exchanged, dated and owned.
Changes, impact analysis and configuration
Change requests analysed for their impact on safety goals and work products, decided and implemented under configuration control, so the evidence matches the version that ships.
Tool register and qualification
Every development tool with its use cases, its determined confidence level and any qualification evidence, reviewed when a tool or version changes.
Reviews, audits and assessments
Confirmation reviews, functional safety audits and assessments planned per project and ASIL, reviewer independence recorded, findings closed with evidence before release.
Safety after release
Safety anomalies from production and the field investigated, safety-related special characteristics handed to production, and service and decommissioning instructions under control.
What this means at the audit
The certification body or assessor asks for the processes, the competence of the people involved, the hazard analysis, interface agreements, tool decisions, confirmation records and open findings. In Effivity each is a screen with dates, owners and links to the evidence, not a folder assembled the week before. After certification, Sustain™ runs in the same workspace, so the next project starts from a system that kept working.
In your engagement
- Subscription included with the engagement, at no additional cost
- Configured by your Sterling consultant within the agreed scope
- Your existing registers and records migrated, not retyped
- Admin and user training for engineering, quality and management
- QMS modules for ISO 9001 and IATF 16949, and ISMS modules when you integrate other standards
ISO 26262 client experience
Client letters on file, available on request.
Signed client letters for ISO 26262 are available on request. The client feedback wall lists every letter by standard.
How ISO 26262 fits a supplier's system
One quality system, one safety lifecycle.
- 01How integrated programmes run
Automotive electronics supplier: functional safety on an IATF 16949 base
ISO 26262 is commonly implemented on top of an IATF 16949 quality management system. In such a programme the quality system supplies document control, competence, supplier management and internal audit; the safety processes add the lifecycle, hazard analysis, interface agreements and confirmation measures; one development process also carries ISO/SAE 21434 or Automotive SPICE where customers ask for them; and one Effivity workspace and management review cover quality and safety.
Sterling Academy · ISO 26262 e-learning
Train every engineer and manager on ISO 26262, not just the safety team.
Sterling Academy runs e-learning for everyone whose work touches the safety lifecycle: video lessons with practice checkpoints, a final exam and a numbered Certificate of Completion for each learner that can be verified online. Sterling consulting clients benefit from preferential course access and special pricing through their Sterling consultant, including complimentary awareness training for their people as part of the engagement.
- ISO 26262 awareness for engineers, testers, project leads and managers, evidence of the competence Part 2 asks you to manage
- Practitioner courses for project leads, process owners and functional safety leads
- Internal auditor training for the people who will audit your safety processes, as applicable to your standard, as part of the engagement
- Learner progress by team and site, and a training status report for the assessor
- New engineers and contractors trained as they join, so competence records stay current
- A Sterling consultant on hand when a learner has a question
Keep exploring
Explore more about ISO 26262
Watch a video on how to implement ISO 26262 here.
Watch a video on ISO 26262 requirements here.
Why Sterling
Want successful ISO 26262 certification? Come to Sterling.
For one development centre or engineering sites across countries, Sterling helps you run one safety process with clear local ownership, without pretending every customer, toolchain or project is the same.
60+ countries, management systems since 2003
Management systems implemented for manufacturers, engineering firms and technology businesses in 60+ countries, with one engagement team accountable across every site in scope.
All-inclusive proposal
Consulting, Effivity, training and Academy access in one proposal, with certification-body and assessor fees shown separately, so nothing arrives later.
A safety process your engineers will use
Fewer documents and more effect: reviews and records built into how your projects already plan, design and release, so safety is how engineering works, not a parallel file.
Expert and experienced consultants
Consultants who have advised on management systems across sectors and countries since 2003 and build your functional safety management properly the first time.
The Sterling Promise
What our ISO 26262 certification success guarantee means
We stay with you until the agreed ISO 26262 outcome is reached, whether a certified product, tool or development process or a completed functional safety assessment, supporting implementation, preparation and the closure of findings. Clear explanations, practical delivery, included software and training for your engineers build capability that outlasts the certificate.
The engagement defines the objects, parts, ASILs, outcome and responsibilities. Your organisation provides accurate information and applies the agreed processes. The certification body or independent assessor evaluates conformity and keeps its decision. Our commitment covers the agreed support, not future sourcing decisions or field performance.
After certification
What happens after ISO 26262 certification?
A product or tool certificate describes a defined object, version and conditions of use, and holds only while they stay true: every change goes through impact analysis, and anything beyond the certificate's conditions goes to the certification body before release. A process certificate is kept by surveillance audits and recertification on the body's cycle, while each new project runs the lifecycle again.
Under Sterling OS™ Sustain™ we review project findings, safety anomalies and competence with you alongside the planned internal audits, management reviews and surveillance preparation, so functional safety stays part of engineering between evaluations.
FAQs
Frequently asked questions about ISO 26262
Can our company be ISO 26262 certified?
Not in the way a company is certified to ISO 9001 or IATF 16949: ISO 26262 has no accredited management-system certification of the ISO/IEC 17021-1 kind. Certification bodies certify defined objects: products and components, software tools and development processes. TÜV Rheinland, for example, certifies automotive functional safety management systems and processes under a programme it bases on ISO/IEC 17021 and ISO/IEC 17065; TÜV SÜD states that it is accredited to certify development tools, development processes and safety-relevant products or systems. Your customer may ask for one of these, for the functional safety assessment of your project, or for both.
Is ISO 26262 mandatory?
No law makes it mandatory as such; it is a voluntary industry standard. In practice vehicle manufacturers increasingly require it of the suppliers who develop safety-related electronics and software for them, so for many suppliers it becomes mandatory the day a contract says so.
What is an ASIL, and what does QM mean?
An automotive safety integrity level is assigned to each safety goal by the hazard analysis and risk assessment, which rates each hazardous event for severity, probability of exposure and controllability. ASIL D carries the most stringent requirements and ASIL A the least. A hazard rated QM (quality management) needs no ASIL and no ISO 26262 safety requirements; normal quality processes apply. The ASIL decides which requirements and methods of the series apply.
Does Sterling issue ISO 26262 certificates or perform the functional safety assessment?
No. Sterling provides consulting and hands-on support. Certificates are issued by certification bodies, and the functional safety assessment needs the independence ISO 26262 sets for the ASIL, so a consultant who helped produce your work products cannot assess them. A provider offering to build your safety case and certify it is offering paper.
Who issues ISO 26262 certificates, and how can we check one?
Certification bodies with functional safety programmes, among them TÜV SÜD, TÜV Rheinland and exida. TÜV Rheinland's functional safety product certification is accredited by DAkkS to ISO/IEC 17065, with valid certificates on Certipedia; exida describes itself as an ANSI-accredited certification body and lists certified products on its SAEL. Read what the certificate names, including object, version, edition, ASIL and conditions of use, and confirm the body's accreditation scope with the accreditation body.
We hold IATF 16949. Do we still need ISO 26262?
If you develop safety-related E/E systems, yes. IATF 16949 requires documented processes for managing product-safety-related products and manufacturing processes; ISO 26262 adds the safety lifecycle for the E/E design itself, from hazard analysis and ASILs to confirmation measures. ISO 26262-2 expects a quality management system to support functional safety, so your IATF 16949 system is the foundation, not a substitute.
How does ISO 26262 relate to ISO 21448 (SOTIF) and ISO/SAE 21434?
They address different causes of harm. ISO 26262 covers hazards from malfunctioning behaviour of E/E systems. ISO 21448:2022 covers insufficiencies in the specification or performance of the intended functionality, for emergency intervention systems and driving automation at levels 1 to 5, and does not apply to faults covered by ISO 26262. ISO/SAE 21434:2021 sets engineering requirements for cybersecurity risk management, and ISO 26262-2 gives informative guidance on its interaction with functional safety.
What does the third edition of ISO 26262 mean for us?
Drafts of all twelve parts were registered as Draft International Standards in August 2026, and no publication date has been announced. Keep implementing, and being assessed, to ISO 26262:2018; when the new edition is published, Sterling's Revise™ service reviews what changes, and you agree with customers and your certification body when it applies.
Does ISO 26262 apply to trucks, motorcycles and semiconductors?
The 2018 edition applies to safety-related E/E systems in series-production road vehicles other than mopeds, including trucks, buses, trailers and semi-trailers and, through Part 12, motorcycles. Part 11 is informative guidance for semiconductors. Systems released for production, or already in development, before the 2018 edition was published are exempt from its scope; alterations to them are handled by tailoring the safety lifecycle.
Before the first call
Prepare a useful ISO 26262 readiness brief
No safety manual is needed before the first discussion; a short account of what you develop, for whom, and what they have asked for is enough. Seven questions cover it:
- Which customer is asking for ISO 26262, for which products and ASIL, and in what form: a certificate, an assessment report or work products under an interface agreement?
- What do you develop: systems, hardware, software, semiconductors or tools, and for which vehicle types?
- Which parts of the safety lifecycle are yours, and which does a customer or supplier carry?
- What is in place: IATF 16949 or ISO 9001, Automotive SPICE results, earlier hazard analyses or safety cases, a register of development tools?
- What have customer audits, assessments, field issues or internal reviews told you about the starting point?
- Who can decide and give time from engineering, quality and management, and who will own functional safety?
- Is there a sample phase, start of production, supplier audit or assessment date to plan around?
We use the answers to size the work and draft a realistic proposal. They open a discussion and are neither a score nor a certification decision.
Don’t be fooled by certification scams
If it takes ten days, it is not ISO 26262 certification.
An ISO 26262 certificate is worth something when it names what was certified, to which edition and ASIL, by whom and under what conditions, and when the work products behind it would survive a customer's functional safety audit. The market still sells paper: company-wide "ISO 26262 certificates", "ASIL D compliant" badges with no scope, and assessments by the people who wrote the documents. They cost less, until a vehicle manufacturer asks for the hazard analysis.
How to choose a credible ISO 26262 provider
- Ask what exactly will be certified, a product and its version, a software tool or a development process, and which part, edition and ASIL the certificate will state.
- Check the body, not the logo. Confirm its accreditation scope with the accreditation body and find the certificate in the body's own register, such as TÜV Rheinland's Certipedia or exida's SAEL.
- Ask which work products the evaluation will examine. Hazard analysis, safety concepts, analyses, verification and safety case should be read; a questionnaire answered remotely examines nothing.
- Check the independence. Whoever built your work products cannot confirm them, and one invoice for consulting and certificate is a conflict of interest, not a convenience.
- Ask what your engineers will learn and where the evidence will live. Without training and a working system, the process leaves with the consultant.
- Walk away from "ISO 26262 certified in ten days", company-wide certificates sold like ISO 9001, and "we manage everything". A safety lifecycle has to run on real projects before anyone can evaluate it.
Keep exploring
More on ISO 26262 and related standards
More in Automotive, aerospace, rail & defence
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