here is where they will flash

The silent ballet of radar cars continues on the roads of France. Since the start of 2025, you will also be able to see them in the Occitanie, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur regions, announcement at actu.fr road safety.

Only Île-de-France and Corsica still escape, to this day, this system which tracks speeding day and night. Unmarked vehicles, discreet anti-driver weapons, which use an infrared flash, not visible to users who have a heavy foot.

These vehicles, formerly called “mobile field equipment (ETM)” or “new generation mobile radar”, are devices on board unmarked cars, driven by gendarmes, police officers or… private companies authorized by the State .

“In 2025, we will have 110 radar cars in total,” assures actu.fr road safety, in the face of “false information” circulating on social networks, inflating this number. “Fixed, on-board devices… there are around 4,700 radars in service in France, there is little movement. Concerning radar cars, the new thing, however, is that this system is spreading,” admits the head of the road safety press office.

An average of six hours of daily patrol

Of these 110 radar cars circulating on the roads of France, 50 are driven by law enforcement and 60 by private companies. The objective of this “delegation” being to “free up time for the police to carry out drug and alcohol checks,” it is explained.

These vehicles operate 7 days a week, including public holidays, with an average of six hours of daily patrol.

Radar cars are not signaled on the roads: these new systems are integrated into unmarked vehicles and use an infrared flash, not visible to flashed users.

Private cars since 2018

Since 2018, road safety has entrusted private companies with the responsibility of controlling speeding on the roads of France. Without distinctive markings, driven by private drivers, these ordinary vehicles blend discreetly into traffic.

To spot these vehicles among the others, you have to have a keen eye. Typically, a black box with the infrared sensor is installed on the dashboard. At the rear, if the window is not tinted, it is possible to see a small square which contains the small on-board cameras to capture images of the offense.

The routes of these vehicles are determined by state services, under the authority of prefects, on motorways, national, departmental or municipal roads. These are mainly accident-prone sections of road.

From 61 km/h in urban areas, 146 km/h on motorways

These cars can flash the vehicles they follow and those they pass, if there is no central reservation.

According to road safety, these radars target vehicles traveling from 61 km/h in built-up areas, 124 km/h on expressways and 146 km/h on motorways.

These radars are designed to target drivers responsible for excessive speeding: the technical margin of these radars is 10 km/h for speed limits below 100 km/h and 10% for speed limits above 100 km/h (compared to 5 km/h and 5% for other speed control radars).

Notices of contravention are managed by the national processing center in Rennes (Ille-et-Vilaine). And the private operator “is not paid for the number of flashes”, insists road safety.

Cars that trap motorists?

Some motorists are worried about seeing these private radar cars making money from their services by seeking to trap them, in particular by encouraging them to overtake them and increase the number of flashes.

But road safety makes it clear that these radar cars “operate perfectly when driving at the maximum authorized speed” and that their drivers have “a contractual obligation to travel at an appropriate speed in the normal flow of traffic”. These companies are also not paid by the number of flashes, but by the number of kilometers traveled during speed checks, according to an objective set by contract.

Note that a site, radar-privé.fr, publishes in each department, based on observations, the brand and models used by private companies, with the vehicle's registration plate… But these cars regularly change their department. And the models are generally very common on French roads and therefore difficult to spot.

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