The Open Charge Alliance (OCA), the body that maintains the Open Charge Point Protocol, announced on Monday, October 12, 2026, that "OCPP 2.1 testing is now available." The new test cases sit in OCTT Professional, the paid tier of the alliance's cloud-based compliance test tool, which supports OCPP 1.6, OCPP 2.0.1 and OCPP 2.1.

According to the announcement, manufacturers and developers can use OCTT Professional to test their OCPP implementations, accelerate development, identify potential issues and prepare for certification. Among the OCPP 2.1 capabilities that can now be tested, the OCA lists ISO 15118-20 support, bidirectional power transfer and improved smart charging.

The OCA said the milestone resulted from close collaboration with its Golden System Under Test (SUT) Partners, who it said played an important role in testing the new capabilities. "As OCA we are very pleased and excited with this release, and we look forward to seeing how the industry puts these new capabilities to use!" the alliance wrote.

What 2.1 adds

The OCA published the OCPP 2.1 specification on January 23, 2025. As its January 2025 post describes it, 2.1 extends OCPP 2.0.1 and adds:

  • ISO 15118-20 support, including bidirectional power transfer;
  • a bidirectional charging (V2X) functional block;
  • a DER-control functional block for integration with distributed energy resources;
  • smart charging improvements;
  • more transaction options, covering fixed-cost, energy- or time-based transactions and the ability to resume a transaction after a forced reboot;
  • battery-swap support;
  • local cost calculation on the charging station;
  • prepaid charge cards;
  • ad hoc payment by credit or debit card through a built-in or stand-alone credit card terminal;
  • secure dynamic QR codes for ad hoc payment.

In a February 27, 2025 explainer, CSMS vendor AMPECO wrote that "OCPP 2.1 builds on OCPP 2.0.1 with minimal core changes." It said local cost calculation lets stations calculate session costs without relying on cloud systems, including in offline scenarios; that ad hoc payment lets users pay by credit or debit card without an account; and that ISO 15118-20 lets operators support vehicle-to-grid, vehicle-to-home and vehicle-to-building scenarios (V2G, V2H and V2B).

Where OCPP stands

The new test cases arrive as the industry is still moving to 2.0.1. The OCA's 2025 annual report says it certified 286 products for OCPP that year: 207 under OCPP 1.6 and 79 under OCPP 2.0.1, a 97.5% increase in 2.0.1 certificates over 2024 as "certification activity shifted from OCPP 1.6 to OCPP 2.0.1." The 2.1 specification was downloaded 24,910 times in 2025, was adopted by the IEC as IEC 63584-210:2025, and its official test cases were released in December 2025.

Compatibility across versions

In its January 2025 post, the OCA wrote that "Care has been taken to make sure that all application logic developed for OCPP 2.0.1 will continue to work in OCPP 2.1." It added that OCPP 1.6 has different application logic and is therefore not compatible with OCPP 2.1, and that "Both older versions, 2.0.1 and 1.6, will continue to be supported."

The test tool and its pricing

OCTT is a cloud-based, subscription tool with a web interface for testing the OCPP implementations of charging station management systems (CSMS), charging stations and charging-station software stacks, licensed for an organization's internal use. The OCA's test-tool page listed these terms for the Professional tier as of October 20, 2026:

ItemOCTT Professional
Test cases2,000+
Daily test runsUnlimited
AutomationAPI for CI/CD integration
OutputVendor Declaration of Conformance (VDoc)
Annual price, OCA participants (Adopter and Implementer categories)€7,900
Annual price, other organizations€17,900

The same page lists a free OCTT Starter tier with 300+ core test cases and a limited number of daily test runs, marked "Coming in 2027." A free 14-day trial covers selected OCPP 1.6 and OCPP 2.0.1 test cases.

How it relates to US federal charging rules

The Federal Highway Administration's minimum standards in 23 CFR part 680 apply to projects funded under the National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) Formula Program and to publicly accessible EV chargers funded with Title 23 highway funds. Section 680.108(b) states that "Chargers must conform to Open Charge Point Protocol (OCPP) 1.6J or higher" and that "By February 28, 2024, chargers must conform to OCPP 2.0.1." That compliance date passed more than two and a half years ago.

On the vehicle side, section 680.108(a) requires chargers to conform to ISO 15118-3 and to "have hardware capable of implementing both ISO 15118-2 and ISO 15118-20," and, by the same February 28, 2024 date, requires charger software to conform to ISO 15118-2 and be capable of Plug and Charge. The protocol version the regulation names is OCPP 2.0.1.

What It Means for Drivers

Nothing changes at the plug today. The release is a test tool for manufacturers and software developers; it adds no feature to chargers already in service.

What it does is open the path for the 2.1 features drivers would notice, chiefly paying by credit or debit card without an account, station-side cost calculation and ISO 15118-20 bidirectional charging, to be tested ahead of certification. Those features reach a given charger only after its maker implements them and the network deploys them, and bidirectional functions also depend on the vehicle.

For federally funded chargers, the rule still points to OCPP 2.0.1, so 2.1 support is not something NEVI-funded stations are required to offer.

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