Cabotage Rules 2026: 3 in 7, Cooling-Off, Posting and Smart Tachograph

The short version

• Cabotage is a domestic job done by a haulier from another EU country. After an international delivery you may carry out up to 3 cabotage operations, with the last unloading within 7 days.
• Cooling-off: after its cabotage in a country ends, the same truck may not do cabotage there again for 4 days.
• The 8-week truck return rule is gone, annulled by the EU Court of Justice on 4 October 2024. The driver's return home every 4 weeks (3 after two reduced weekly rests in a row) and the ban on the 45-hour weekly rest in the cab still apply.
• Cabotage and cross-trade are postings: declare them in the EU's IMI portal and keep a copy in the cab.
• Smart tachograph version 2 has been required in every truck working abroad since 19 August 2025, and in vans over 2.5 t since 1 July 2026.

This is general information, not legal advice; check the national rules where you work.

What counts as cabotage

Regulation (EC) 1072/2009 defines cabotage as "national carriage for hire or reward carried out on a temporary basis in a host Member State". A Lithuanian truck taking a load from Lyon to Paris is doing cabotage.

• You need a Community licence. A driver from outside the EU also needs a driver attestation.
• The international load comes first. Every consignment of it must be unloaded. Cabotage can start the same day.
• The motor vehicle counts. The tractor unit that made the international delivery does the cabotage, and it may pull a different trailer.
• Empty pallets or containers moved under a transport contract count as a cabotage operation.

The 3 in 7 rule and the 4-day cooling-off

After the international delivery, the same vehicle may carry out up to three cabotage operations. The last unloading must take place within 7 days of the last unloading of the international load. Days are calendar days counted from midnight, so a truck unloaded on a Monday must finish its cabotage by the end of the following Monday.

The operations may be spread over several countries, but in a country entered empty only one is allowed, within 3 days of entry and inside the same 7 days.

The cooling-off period, added by Regulation (EU) 2020/1055, bans cabotage with the same vehicle in the same country for 4 days after its cabotage there ends. It runs separately for each country, and international trips, transit or cabotage elsewhere remain allowed. If the last cabotage unloading is on a Monday, cabotage there can start again on Saturday.

Weekends and public holidays stretch these periods: one that ends on a Saturday, Sunday or holiday runs to the end of the next working day.

On Start2Load's load board the Cabotage filter shows listings loaded and delivered in the same country, so a carrier abroad can find domestic work in the country where it has just unloaded.

Combined transport

When a trailer or container travels part of the way by rail, inland waterway or sea, the road legs fall under Directive 92/106/EEC, which lets any EU haulier drive the first or last road leg without the cabotage limits. Since 2022 a country may apply cabotage rules to those legs to stop misuse, with a period longer than 7 days and a cooling-off shorter than 4, so check before planning rail-road work.

Truck home every 8 weeks: annulled. Driver home every 3 or 4 weeks: in force

On 4 October 2024 the Court of Justice annulled the Mobility Package rule that trucks in international transport must return to their home country every eight weeks, in a case brought by seven Member States, Lithuania among them. The court upheld the rest of the package, including the cooling-off period and these rules for drivers:

• Every 4 weeks the company must organise work so the driver can return to the employer's operating centre in the home country, or to the place where he or she lives, and spend a regular weekly rest there.
• After 3 weeks in practice, if the driver has taken two reduced weekly rests in a row: the return must come before the compensating rest.
• The company must document how it meets this.

Weekly rest outside the cab

A regular weekly rest is at least 45 hours. It may not be taken in the vehicle, and neither may a compensating weekly rest of more than 45 hours. The driver needs suitable accommodation with proper sleeping and sanitary facilities, paid for by the employer. A reduced weekly rest, at least 24 hours but under 45, is not covered by the ban.

Abroad, a driver may take two reduced weekly rests in a row if any four consecutive weeks include four weekly rests, two of them regular. Each reduction is made up in one block by the end of the third week after it.

Posting of drivers and the IMI declaration

Under Directive (EU) 2020/1057 a driver doing cabotage is posted, and so is a driver doing cross-trade, such as a Latvian truck carrying from Poland to Germany. For that time the driver is entitled to the host country's terms of employment, in particular its pay rules.

Not postings: bilateral trips from or to the home country, even with one extra loading or unloading in a country crossed (as long as the driver does not load and unload in the same country), and transit.

The employer files one declaration per driver and host country in the Road Transport Posting Declaration portal, connected to IMI, at the latest when the posting starts. In the cab, on paper or on screen:

1. A copy of the posting declaration.
2. Evidence of the transport in the host country, such as a CMR or e-CMR.
3. The tachograph records, in particular the country symbols.

Afterwards the host country can ask through IMI for payslips, proof of payment, the employment contract and time sheets. The company has eight weeks to send them.

Smart tachograph version 2

Every EU-registered truck working in another Member State has needed the second version of the smart tachograph since 19 August 2025. Analogue and older digital units had to go by 31 December 2024, first-version smart units by 18 August 2025.

It records the vehicle's position by satellite at the start and end of the working day, at every border crossing and every three hours of driving, and it records loading and unloading. In such a truck the driver no longer enters border crossings by hand.

Manual entries still matter: other work, availability and driving vehicles not covered by the EU rules must be recorded with the manual input or on a printout. Some older driver cards cannot hold the 56 days of records a check can cover, so carry printouts until the driver has a version 2 card; all cards will be version 2 by August 2028.

Time limits at a glance

What roadside checks look for

For cabotage, officers ask for the CMR of the incoming international trip and of each cabotage operation, showing sender, haulier and consignee with signatures, the places and dates, the goods, the gross weight and the number plates of truck and trailer. An e-CMR is accepted, and the driver may call the office during the check. The tachograph's border crossings show where the truck has been.

Trans.info lists the common faults: no CMR for the international trip, missing dates, places or signatures, unrecorded trailer changes, more than three operations, and cabotage started before the international load was fully unloaded.

In May 2026 Germany's BALM found a violation in 112 of 634 weekly rest checks, almost 18%, and 14 confirmed violations in 628 cabotage checks. A Belgian check around Antwerp on a Sunday evening that month found 24 of 50 drivers on their regular weekly rest in the cab.

Fines in key countries

French figures come from the French government, the others from trans.info; German fines for rest in the cab differ between sources. Serious cabotage breaches also count against a company's good repute, and Germany has barred one haulier from cabotage from 1 October 2026 to 30 September 2027 after 23 penalty proceedings.

Vans over 2.5 t

Since 1 July 2026 a van whose maximum permissible mass with any trailer is over 2.5 t needs a smart tachograph when used for international transport or cabotage, and its driver follows the truck rules on driving and rest. Read more about the van rules.

What comes next

From 9 July 2027 authorities in every Member State must accept freight transport information that operators share electronically through certified eFTI platforms. We found no planned change to the cabotage limits.

For shippers and forwarders

Member States must also sanction consignors, forwarders and contractors who knew, or ought to have known, that the transport they ordered broke the cabotage or posting rules. A price far below the market is the classic warning sign. On Start2Load every company is reviewed before it gets access and verified with documents before it can post.