For more information, visit https://www.idtechex.com/en/research-report/automotive-radar-2024-2044-forecasts-technologies-applications/966.
Spurred by the adoption of new advanced driver assistance technologies during this century, the automotive radar market has blossomed. However, despite its widespread adoption and popularity IDTechEx predicts within this report that there are still substantial opportunities for this humble sensor, both in terms of new technology developments and new applications. As such this market with a value of more than US$8 billion still has the potential for long, sustained, and steady growth with a 10-year CAGR of 6.9%. This report explains those opportunities, details new and emerging automotive radar technologies, thoroughly examines the existing market, and provides a 20-year forecast of its continued growth and transformation.
4D radar
Automotive radar has been a common sensor used within the car market for more than 20 years. Thus far its deployment hasn’t warranted significant imaging performance, but with the emergence and demand for higher levels of autonomy this is changing. Radar provides exceptional performance in poor weather, night-time, low reflectivity objects, and direct sunlight compared to its competitors. However, its ability to create the high-resolution images necessary for identifying free space to drive in and even perform basic object classification has so far been missing. Most radars on the market even today miss the ability to resolve in the elevation direction which creates significant pitfalls in its performance.
Over the past few years 4D radar and imaging radar have emerged, and in the past two years they have begun deployment onto consumer vehicles. This report highlights which radar currently available from leading tier ones such as Continental, Bosch, and ZF could be classified as 4D imaging radars. Additionally known deployments onto existing consumer vehicles are listed and the tier one radar are benchmarked against emerging start-ups such as Arbe, Uhnder, Zendar and more.
There is a selection of technological avenues available for improving radar angular resolution performance. This report explains the options available, how they work, the potential for improvement they offer, and which companies have been developing them. An ambitious goal of the automotive radar players has been to get below 0.1˚ of angular resolution in both the elevation and azimuth directions. With this level of performance, a radar would be able to detect an object such as a tire on its side at 200m. Some emerging technologies are getting towards this level of performance, and this report discusses how, and how there are still limitations. Furthermore, the report explores other potential technology developments that could continue the performance growth of radar.
Growing emphasis on short range radars driven by radar cocooning features
Short range and long-range radars both have important roles in enabling ADAS functionality. Forward facing dependent ADAS applications such as adaptive cruise control and automatic emergency braking require the long detection distances and high resolution offered by the cutting-edge long-range radar products. While short range radar products typically fulfil applications that don’t require so much performance, such as blind spot detection systems.
Forward facing ADAS applications such as adaptive cruise control are now widely adopted, which means that the growth potential for long range radar is reducing. This report found that there were 0.69 long range radars shipped per vehicle in 2022. This is set to grow, but with the vast majority of autonomous applications utilizing only a single front radar, IDTechEx predicts its adoption ceiling will be little over 1 per vehicle. Some vehicles, such as robotaxis and privately owned level 4 vehicles will consume more than one high performance, long range, 4D imaging radar per vehicle, but even by the end of this reports 20-year forecast that makes up only a small contingency of the automotive market.
For significant growth in overall radar numbers, one should instead turn to the short-range radar. In 2022 IDTechEx measured only 0.6 short range radar per vehicle. There is clear potential for this figure to more than treble as blind spot detection systems require at least two short range radar. Furthermore, see in this report how evolving ADAS features will require more short-range radar per vehicle, and how new semiconductor and packaging technologies could position radar as a compelling alternative to ultrasonic devices for parking sensor applications.
Autonomous mobility as a service coming of age
One of the biggest drivers for the future growth of the automotive radar market will be the emergence and widespread adoption of autonomous vehicles. These vehicles use many radars for understanding the environment and different obstacles. In fact, one of the leaders and most prominent companies in robotaxi development, Cruise, uses 21 radars per vehicle. Close rival, Waymo, relies more heavily on cameras in its sensor suite, yet it still has an impressive six radar, all of which IDTechEx believe to be high performance 4D imaging radar.
Currently, many of these vehicles are deployed for testing in California, with the leaders, Waymo and Cruise having a combined fleet of more than 1,000 vehicles. However, that is small in the grand scheme of the automotive market. The promising development within the past two years is that commercial robotaxi services are beginning to come online. It is now possible for members of the public to pay for autonomous mobility as a service (MaaS) in several cities across the US including San Francisco, Phoenix, and Las Vegas. For the automotive radar market this signifies a new phase of market growth propelled by vehicles that require numerous high performance automotive radar.
This report covers the requirements for this new era of vehicle and how their emergence will change the automotive market. IDTechEx predicts that this new mobility opportunity will have noticeable impact on the demand for new personally owned vehicles, causing the car market to peak. Despite this, see how the forecasts for automotive radar still predict continued growth after the peak in passenger car sales.
Dr James Jeffs
Senior Technology Analyst, IDTechEx
