Belgium has officially become the fifth EU member state to grant full approval for use of the Tesla FSD self-driving system. After succesful trials with a test vehicle, the Flemish Minister of Mobility, Annick De Ridder (NV-A), has granted approval. As regulatory barriers across Europe continue to fall, Tesla has simultaneously overhauled the pricing model for its assisted-driving package.

The Netherlands were the first to allow FSD and by doing so they have triggered a regulatory domino effect under EU law. Approval is trickling down to the rest of Western Europe, faster than most expected. Lithuania, Estonia, and Denmark had already followed the Dutch lead. Now Belgium has too.

Full approval signed

Annick De Ridder, signed the formal approval on June 10. The decision marks the end of a process that started with a single test vehicle and 5,000 kilometres of supervised driving on Belgian roads – a pilot phase that has now been successfully completed and formally submitted for review.

Under Belgium’s federal structure, an authorisation granted by any of the country’s three regional governments applies nationwide. Tesla can therefore operate FSD Supervised across all Belgian territory on the basis of De Ridder’s Flemish approval alone.

A quiz before you drive

There is one catch for Belgian Tesla owners who are eager to try the system: before activating FSD for the first time, they must complete a mandatory in-car tutorial and pass a short quiz. This is a direct requirement of UN Regulation 171, which governs automated lane-keeping systems and requires drivers to demonstrate they understand the system’s limitations and their own continued responsibility behind the wheel.

The two-question quiz asks drivers to identify when FSD is active and to confirm they remain legally responsible for the vehicle’s behaviour at all times.

The 5,000 km test phase was designed to allow authorities to evaluate how Tesla’s sensor suite and neural network interact with Belgian infrastructure and real-world traffic dynamics. That box has been ticked.

What has not changed is the legal and safety framework. FSD Supervised is still classified as Level 2 on the SAE scale. The driver must remain attentive and ready to intervene at any moment. Overconfident drivers in the US have caused accidents by placing too much trust in the system. Tesla has faced convictions in its home market over such incidents. In Europe, there’s no room for debate: legal responsibility rests firmly with the driver.

Regulatory Loophole

Belgium’s approval, like those of Lithuania, Estonia, and Denmark before it, is a direct consequence of the regulatory breakthrough achieved in the Netherlands. The Dutch vehicle authority RDW granted provisional European homologation for FSD Supervised following an 18-month evaluation programme covering more than 1.6 million kilometres of road testing.

Tesla’s approach operates outside the bounds of traditional European automotive regulations, which historically limit automated steering torque and hands-free driving to roughly 20 seconds before requiring driver intervention. Instead, Tesla leveraged a specific “deviation procedure” under EU rules – a legal mechanism that allows one member state to grant provisional homologation. While the European Commission deliberates on a final, binding ruling, other EU states can use the Dutch precedent to issue their own authorisations.

The EU Technical Committee on Motor Vehicles (TCMV) is scheduled to discuss the critical Article 39 exemption – the legal backbone of Tesla’s European approval route – on June 30. No vote has been placed on the agenda, but the discussion is widely seen as a key step toward a potential EU-wide ruling. Tesla has officially confirmed that 12 countries are currently pending approval, including France, Spain, Germany, the UK, Portugal, Ireland, Denmark, and Norway.

End of the one-time purchase

Some car makers, like Ford and Mercedes, offer similarly advanced levels of automated driving but on geo-fenced stretches of Belgian motorways or under limited conditions such as traffic jams – in part because cameras track and verify driver attentiveness. Tesla’s approach is broader and less constrained, which is precisely what makes regulators nervous.

As Tesla navigates the European regulatory maze, it has also finished overhauling its sales strategy. The option to purchase FSD outright across all of Europe has been replaced by a monthly subscription. The economics are not entirely unfavourable for drivers: at €99 per month, it would take over six years to reach the old €7,500 purchase price, and the subscription can be paused when not needed.

Resistance from the north

Still, not all European countries are equally enthusiastic about the Dutch gateway for FSD. Scandinavian regulators have been among the most openly sceptical. Sweden’s transport agency noted that they were “quite surprised” to learn Tesla permitted FSD to exceed posted speed limits – and that this should not be permitted. Finnish transport officials added strong question marks to a system that was “introducing hands-free driving on icy 80 km/h roads.”

Both countries point to a fundamental differece: Tesla’s training data is heavily weighted toward Californian road conditions. The European road network – narrower, more complex, and in Nordic countries covered in snow for months – is a different proposition. Norway has separately indicated it wants to ban the use of the term “Self-Driving” in connection with the system altogether.

The June meeting of EU officials might turn out a more revealing test. The outcome of that discussion will determine whether Belgium can continue with FSD or faces rewinding the granted approval.