Advocacy
Europe
Since 2010, the Directive on Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) regulates the framework for the deployment of these systems in the field of road transport and for interfaces with other modes of transport. In December 2021, the European Commission published a proposal to amend the ITS Directive. The proposal was reviewed by the European co-legislators at the end of 2022 and adopted in October 2023. The revised Directive aims to take account of technological developments, including connected and automated mobility, on-demand mobility applications and multimodal transport.
European administrations have designated the bands 5855-5875 MHz and 5875-5925 MHz – for use by road ITS as specified. As is common practice in Europe, the spectrum is designated on a technology-neutral basis.
United States
In November 2020, the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) published its 5.9 GHz ruling, which allowed C-V2X in the upper 30 MHz after an expedited waiver process and placed existing Dedicated Short Range Communications (DSRC) in the lower 10MHz until the end of its phasing out period (one year from the effective date of the R&O).
Industry and state DOTs submitted a joint request for a waiver to deploy C-V2X in the upper MHz of the 5.9 GHz band in December 2021, with the FCC permitting initial deployments in April 2023.
In November 2024, the FCC announced the final spectrum rules for the 5.9 GHz band, establishing the technical framework for transitioning ITS to C-V2X and providing a two-year timeline for sunsetting the use of DSRC-based technology.
In 2024, the US Department of Transportation released a V2X National Deployment Plan, to which 5GAA provided extensive input. The roadmap defined short, medium, and long-term objectives to support the large-scale deployment of C-V2X across the country and is currently being updated to reflect the latest technological and deployment developments.
Asia
China
China was the first country to adopt a national strategy for the Internet of Vehicles (IoV). To demonstrate the potential benefits of connected and intelligent highways and urban roads, more than 90 cities have already partnered with local wireless network operators to deploy RSUs, and China has opened over 5,000 km of roads for intelligent V2X pilot demonstrations.
The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology also established a dedicated C-V2X spectrum in the 5905–5925 MHz band.
In January 2024, the Chinese government launched a pilot project for the “Vehicle-Road-Cloud Integration” application for Intelligent Connected Vehicles. In July 2024, the final list of 20 pilot cities was announced. Since then, these cities have made solid progress in infrastructure development and scenario deployment, while significantly expanding intelligent road coverage.
In the first half of 2025, the 5G deployment rate reached 21.8%, while LTE-V2X deployment reached 3%. Many OEMs have achieved mass production of 5G/LTE-V2X-based V2V, V2I, and V2N warning applications.
South Korea
In South Korea, 70 MHz has been allocated as ITS spectrum in the 5.9 GHz band.
In March 2022, when the Ministry of Science and ICT (MSIT) released its spectrum policy for the 5.9 GHz ITS band, it allocated 20 MHz to LTE-V2X and 30 MHz to DSRC.
In December 2023, South Korea selected C-V2X direct communications as its technology of choice, complementing C-V2X mobile network communications to provide a synergistic platform for connected mobility.
Following this decision, in June 2024, the Korean MSIT released the final technical regulation standard, maintaining the 20 MHz allocation for LTE-V2X, reserving 50 MHz for future study, and deciding to phase out DSRC by June 2027.
To support the deployment of LTE-V2X services in Korea, but also to explore 5G-V2X deployment plans in the country, the MSIT established a C-V2X study group in 2025, bringing together industry and government stakeholders.
Japan
In its 2020 revision of the Frequency Reorganization Action Plan, Japan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) expressed its intention to open the 5.9 GHz band for ITS services.
As part of the 2022 revision of the Action Plan, the MIC announced that it would study specific utilisation methods for the 5.9 GHz band, in line with international discussions within the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).
To support this effort, the MIC established the “Next-Generation ITS” study group in February 2023 to examine the allocation of the 5.9 GHz band for V2X communications. In its interim reports published in 2023 and 2024, the study group proposed allocating up to 30 MHz for V2X communications and outlined an initial roadmap for deployment, coexistence, and migration considerations.
In January 2026, the Japanese MIC officially announced that the 5.9 GHz band (5888–5925 MHz) had been assigned to V2X communications. Following this decision, the ministry is now focused on defining the technical conditions for operation in the band.
India
In recent years, India has witnessed increasing activities related to V2X. These include updated traffic management system standards introduced by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and the recommendation by the Indian government to include V2X in the Bharat NCAP. Moreover, in December 2023, the Telecommunications Standards Development Society of India (TSDSI) organized a dedicated workshop to explore the global perspective on Connected Vehicles and Autonomous V2X use cases, India’s vision for Connected Autonomous V2X, and the challenges, opportunities, and readiness of the country in adopting these technologies.
In October 2023, the Indian Government’s Telecommunication Engineering Centre (TEC) published a report endorsing C-V2X technology. Building on this work, TEC established a dedicated ITS Task Force in October 2024 to support the development and deployment of ITS across India, including discussions on spectrum allocation in the 5.9 GHz band, recommendation for an ETSI-based ITS stack, and the development of a security and PKI framework for V2X communications.
At the start of 2026, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) announced plans to allocate 30Mhz to V2V communications as a key road-safety measure, marking another important step towards large-scale and interoperable C-V2X deployment in the country.
