ISO 15118 series standards: “mandatory questions” for charging stations to be shipped to the European Union

In the charging pile industry in China, manufacturers often focus on core indicators such as cost, appearance design, structural safety (fire/IP/safety distance), performance parameters (accuracy of current and voltage), compatibility (compatibility with major vehicle manufacturers), and protection functions (emergency stop/fault stop), but there is generally insufficient attention to the consistency of communication protocols between vehicles and piles. Upon investigation, the GB 39752 and GB 44263 standards for CCC certification in China, which reference GB/T 27930 “Digital Communication Protocol between Off board Conductive Chargers and Electric Vehicles” and GB/T 34658 “Consistency Test of Communication Protocol between Off board Conductive Chargers and Battery Management Systems for Electric Vehicles”, are not mandatory requirements.

However, when companies turn their attention to the EU market, communication protocol consistency becomes an insurmountable compliance threshold – the ISO 15118 series standards have become a “passport” for charging stations to go global with the mandatory effect of EU regulations.

The European charging station regulation IEC 61851-24:2014/2023 Appendix C has already specified that high-order communication of DC charging stations needs to comply with the requirements of DIN SPEC 70121:2014 or ISO 15118-2:2014 (either or both can be supported simultaneously).

This requirement has brought challenges to some domestic charging pile enterprises.

But whether it’s purchasing or developing SECC modules in-house, it’s just the first step. After installing the SECC module into the charging station, it is still necessary to prove that the module meets the requirements of DIN SPEC 70121:2014 or ISO 15118-2:2014 of the European standard when combined with the entire station.

To save costs, many pile companies choose to only support DIN SPEC 70121, as this reduces the cost of outsourcing SECC and makes testing easier.

However, only supporting DIN 70121 is no longer sufficient to meet the latest requirements of the European Union.

The European Union released COMMISSION DELEGATED REGULATION (EU) 2025/656 in June 2025. This regulation is a supplement and revision to Regulation (EU) 2023/1804 regarding wireless charging, electric road systems, and hydrogen supply for road transport vehicles. REGULATION (EU) 2023/1804, released in 2023, is more commonly known as the Alternative Fuel Infrastructure Regulation (AFIR). It is a key policy regulation introduced by the EU to accelerate the transition to zero emission transportation and address the shortage of alternative fuel (electricity, hydrogen, etc.) infrastructure. Its purpose is to force member states to improve their infrastructure networks such as charging and refueling through legislation, eliminate users’ anxiety about range and energy replenishment, and support the large-scale popularization of electric vehicles (EVs), hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (FCEVs), and heavy-duty electric trucks.

Simply put, the EU has released a revised version of the Alternative Fuel Infrastructure Regulation (AFIR), which has full legal effect and is a mandatory requirement directly applicable to all member states.

Important revisions include:

• (1) After January 8, 2026, all charging stations that are publicly accessible and newly installed or refurbished, including AC and DC piles, must comply with the requirements of EN ISO 15118-2:2016 at least.
• (2) After January 1, 2027, all charging stations that are publicly accessible and newly installed or refurbished, including AC and DC piles, must comply with the requirements of EN ISO 15118-20:2022 at least. If the charging station provides automatic authentication and authorization services, such as PNC (Plug and Play) function, it needs to comply with both EN ISO 15118-2:2016 and standard EN ISO 15118-20:2022.

After January 1, 2027, all charging stations installed or refurbished at private recharging points must comply with EN IEC 61851-1:2019 for mode 2 AC charging points, and EN ISO 15118-20:2022 for mode 3 AC charging points and mode 4 DC charging points.

In summary, all newly installed or refurbished public DC piles after 2026 must comply with the requirements of EN ISO 15118-2:2016, and all newly installed or refurbished DC piles and Mode 3 AC piles after 2027 must also comply with EN ISO 15118-20:2022.

In the charging station family, only mode 2 IC-CPD is not within the scope of the directive. In China, this type of portable charging station is called on-board charging, and in Europe, the power usually does not exceed 3.7 kW. The explanation given in Regulation (EU) 2025/656 is that mode 2 AC stations using PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) are sufficient, supporting ISO 15118-2 or 20, and will not bring any additional value to the end user.

For domestic pile companies, this new regulation may create significant technical barriers. Just needed to meet DIN 70121, soon mandatory requirement to support ISO 15118; Support both ISO 15118-2 and ISO 15118-20. Some pile companies that want to go global are not familiar with these standards and need to understand the differences between DIN SPEC 70121, ISO 15118-2, and ISO 15118-20, as well as the purpose of supporting them. Why are there so many standards for communication between cars and piles in Europe?

This starts with historical inheritance. In early 2010, the Joint Working Group of IEC Technical Committee 69 (TC69) and ISO Technical Committee 22 (TC22) began collaborating to develop the ISO 15118 series of standards, aiming to address the issue of communication standardization between electric vehicles and charging stations. Due to the comprehensive considerations of the working group and the desire to create a compatible major version, the preparation time for the ISO 15118 series standards was too long, resulting in a delay in their official release.

But the market can’t wait any longer. Especially German car manufacturers hope that their electric vehicles can achieve universal charging as soon as possible and gain market advantages. So the industry stakeholders in Germany joined forces and, within the framework of DIN, extracted some of the relatively mature content discussed in ISO 15118 to develop a German national standard that can be immediately implemented. In 2012, DIN SPEC 70121 was released; Updated in 2014; The testing specification standard DIN SPEC 70122:2018 was released in 2018.

The ISO 15118 standard arrived late and was officially released in its first edition in 2013; In 2014 and 2018, specific application layer standards and testing standards were successively released. ISO 15118 is a vast series of standards that are developing rapidly. There are five standards related to conduction charging in the first generation:

DIN SPEC 70121:2014 can be seen as a simplified version of ISO 15118-2/3 mentioned above. DIN SPEC 70121 only supports DC charging, while ISO 15118-1 to 5 standards can support both AC and DC charging, as well as TLS encryption, plug and play (PNC) functionality, and intelligent charging.

In 2022, the ISO 15118 series released the second generation of charging standards, namely ISO 15118-20:2022 as mentioned earlier. Compared to ISO 15118-2, it also supports TLS1.3 encryption, V2G (transmitting electrical energy to the grid), WPT (wireless charging), and ACD (automatic connection device) functions on the original basis.

The European Commission has considerations for industrial policy. The Directive 2014/94/EU on the deployment of alternative fuel infrastructure was first issued in 2014, when it was not yet a regulation, but rather a directive. Directive is different from mandatory requirements of regulations, as it only specifies the results that need to be achieved, but does not specify quantitative requirements.

The European Commission recognizes the need to accelerate the construction of new energy infrastructure, otherwise it will not only be difficult to achieve the 2050 carbon reduction target, but also fall behind in the competition between the automotive and distributed energy industries. In order to reverse the situation, the EU upgraded the 2014/94/EU directive to Regulation (EU) 2023/1804 in 2023, with clear quantitative targets.

The requirements of ISO 15118-20 clearly demonstrate the EU’s desire to accelerate the implementation of charging stations and electric vehicle dispatch in the power grid, with the latter deeply integrated with the grid. By connecting to the power grid through charging stations, electric vehicles not only serve as vehicles, but also as distributed energy storage units in the power system, and are part of the smart grid.

After the regulations were released, European member states have begun to actively respond. France announced in November 2025 that it will provide ecological subsidies for the purchase of private electric vehicles; In November 2025, Germany released a master plan for charging infrastructure by 2030, fully aligning with the European Union Regulation (AFIR) 2023/1804.

As a globally leading third-party testing and certification organization, T Ü V S Ü D, with 160 years of technological accumulation and professional advantages, can provide full lifecycle compliance support for charging pile enterprises. T Ü V S Ü D will continue to leverage its technological, resource, and global network advantages to jointly promote the global zero carbon transformation of transportation and sustainable development of energy.