ISO 22343: The New International Standard for Vehicle Impact Testing

What ISO 22343 is

ISO 22343-1:2023, published in September 2023, is the international standard for vehicle security barriers and their impact testing. It is now the reference point for hostile vehicle mitigation specifications worldwide — including New Zealand and Australia.

What it replaced

ISO 22343 officially replaced the two standards that built the industry: the UK's BSI PAS 68:2013 and ISO's own interim agreement IWA 14-1:2013. Products certified under those older standards remain valid proof of performance — but new specifications should cite ISO 22343.

What actually changed

This is more than a rebrand. ISO 22343 updates vehicle classifications and adds a mass type to reflect the modern vehicle fleet. It introduces stricter fail conditions: excessive penetration is an automatic fail, and a test vehicle that remains mobile after impact now fails too. Debris rules tightened sharply — the maximum allowable major debris weight dropped from 25 kg to 2 kg, a big win for crowded places where flying fragments kill.

Test discipline also improved: test sites must have uniform ground conditions for consistent results, and a real-time panning camera must capture the full impact sequence.

How to read the rating code

An ISO 22343 rating looks like V/7200[N2A]/80/90:2.5/30.8 — read as: vehicle impact test, 7,200 kg vehicle of class N2A, at 80 km/h, at 90 degrees, with 2.5 m penetration and debris dispersion noted last. Every segment tells you exactly what the barrier survived. Try the interactive decoder in the Standards section of this site.

What specifiers should do

Cite ISO 22343-1:2023 in all new project briefs, and ask suppliers for certificates against it — or valid PAS 68 / IWA 14-1 certificates for existing product lines. Access X supplies products tested to ISO 22343, including the TiSO RB 33X shallow road blocker family and AccessX Fencing crash-rated palisade fencing.