Carseats Standards in New Zealand
Under New Zealand law, the driver is responsible for making sure all children under seven years of age are using a child restraint (car seat) that’s appropriate for their age, size, and development.
Keeping your child safe is the number one priority. As a guide, from 0-2yrs, most babies should be in a rear-facing capsule or car seat, from two to around four or five they should be in a front-facing restraint, and after that, they should stay in a booster seat until they’re 148cm tall.
Read our full guide to choosing a car seat here
New Zealand car seat standards
Every car seat that is sold or used in New Zealand has to be manufactured to a standard that complies with our minimum safety standards.
You will find the car seat safety standard displayed as a sticker or a label on the shell of your child restraint. This will indicate which safety standard your car seat was manufactured to.
When looking at car seats, you may identify a variety of different stickers:
1. The joint Australian, and New Zealand standards. This sticker can be identified as AS/NZS 1754. If you have an Australian standard car seat with this sticker identification it can be bought into New Zealand and used here.
2. The European Standard can be identified by a sticker reading ECE R44/04 or UN R129 and/or i-size. A European standard car seat with a sticker showing these numbers is legal for use within New Zealand.
3. The US standard child restraints can be identified with the code FMVSS 213.
Some child restraints that are manufactured to the US standard are approved for use within New Zealand, but it is important to note that not all are.
Child restraints that are manufactured to AS/NZ and European standards are independently tested to achieve the certification that allows each car seat to be used within New Zealand. However, car seats that are manufactured to the US standard are self-certified.
This is why independent testing of US standard car seats must be run by the certification agency - Bureau Vista - prior to being used here in New Zealand. Once it has been approved for use here, each car seat will have a yellow compliance sticker applied.
Note: If you buy a car seat in America, it won’t be compliant for use in NZ. Even if the exact same model can be purchased here, one bought in America won’t have the required compliance sticker and therefore isn’t legal for use in NZ.
4. You won’t often see the Japanese Car Seat Safety Standard here. It is only approved in NZ for child restraints that are built into a vehicle – eg a built-in booster seat that can’t be removed from the car.
Note: If the car seat standard sticker falls off, or is no longer able to be read (this could be because a car seat is old and has expired), the restraint is not compliant, and therefore it is not legal for use on our roads.
I’m Visiting NZ – Can I bring my own car seat?
When visiting New Zealand from overseas you can bring your own child restraint only if it carries either the AS/NZS 1754 or the ECE R44 / R129 safety standard sticker.
