United Kingdom
The UK retained the EU’s 2019/945 and 2019/947 regulations post-Brexit and has since amended them on its own timeline via The Unmanned Aircraft (Amendment) Regulations 2025 (S.I. 2025/1106). The underlying field lists are, at the time of writing, unedited carry-overs from the EU text — the UK only substituted “CAA” for “national competent authority” and “UK-class” for “C-class” labels — but the applicability dates diverge substantially from the EU’s.
Applicability
- Same product-category split as the EU: Part 6 of the retained 2019/945 Annex covers a retrofit add-on (DRIFT’s category); Part 2 (and by the same pattern Parts 3/4/16/17) covers built-in DRI on factory-built, class-marked UK1/UK2/UK3/UK5/UK6 aircraft.
- Class marks were renamed UK0–UK6 (from the EU’s C0–C6) by S.I. 2025/1106 — a labelling change; the UK now runs its own domestic product-standards framework rather than relying on EU harmonised standards.
Timeline
This is the one area where the UK diverges sharply from the EU, and where DRIFT’s actual retrofit-add-on use case is not yet under a live mandate:
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| 2025-09 | CAA opens voluntary early adoption of Direct RID, inviting feedback |
| 2026-01-01 | Direct RID mandate begins — for class-marked UK1/UK2/UK3/UK5/UK6 aircraft only |
| 2027-12-31 | Last day EU C-class-marked aircraft may fly in the UK “as if” the equivalent UK class |
| 2028-01-01 | Mandate extends to UK0, UK4 model aircraft (unless exempted), privately-built UAS ≥100 g with a camera, and legacy UAS outside UK class marking ≥100 g with a camera — the actual retrofit/add-on scenario |
(CAA, CAP3172 “Remote ID in the UK”; CAA, “Remote ID (RID)” consumer page; The Unmanned Aircraft (Amendment) Regulations 2025)
The CAA regards Direct RID as an interim measure pending a preferred long-term “Hybrid RID” (Direct + Networked) approach.
Required messages & fields
Identical in substance to the EU Part 6 list (see the European Union page for the ASTM message/field mapping): operator registration number, add-on serial number, time stamp, UA position and height, route/course and ground speed, and remote-pilot-or-take-off position. No emergency status field.
(legislation.gov.uk, retained 2019/945, Annex Part 6)
Transports
Same pattern as the EU: no Bluetooth/Wi-Fi/PHY named in the regulation text itself — just “an open and documented transmission protocol.”
Post-Brexit, the UK has its own standard-designation mechanism (retained 2019/945, Article 3A), letting the Secretary of State designate BSI-adopted standards in place of the EU’s “harmonised standards.” Whether EN 4709-002 has actually been designated under Article 3A could not be confirmed against a primary UK source — flagged here as unverified; industry expectation is that the UK will accept the same ASD-STAN/ASTM-F3411-compatible broadcast already implemented for the EU.
Identity & registration fields
| You provide | Goes on the wire as | Format | Where to get it |
|---|---|---|---|
| UK “Remote ID number” | Operator ID message, OperatorId | Same structure as the EU scheme this was carried over from (see European Union): a public registration number plus a separately-issued private/secret part. CAA’s own illustrative example shows the checksum character as 7/b, i.e. “could be either a digit or a letter” — using the actual Luhn mod-36 checksum computed for the rest of that example payload instead: GBR gc284pmztcrt l-2ot (checksum l, self-consistent and verified against the EASA AMC1 Article 14(6) algorithm) | CAA drone operator registration — separate from any EU member state’s registry, not interchangeable with one |
| Add-on serial number | Basic ID message, UASID | ANSI/CTA-2063-A-2019 | Assigned by the add-on’s manufacturer |
A UK Remote ID number also has a separately-held 3-character private key, which CAA explicitly warns must never be entered where it would be broadcast (“Never write your private key on your drone”). Only the public part goes on the wire.
Not required
- Emergency status — omitted from the operative Part 6 text, same as the EU. CAA’s public-facing consumer guidance describes emergency status as part of “what Remote ID transmits” generally without distinguishing add-on vs. built-in, so treat this as legally optional for an add-on, while practically expected once the wider ecosystem catches up.
- UK-specific class-marking logic in the add-on itself — class marks are a concern for whichever airframe the add-on is fitted to, not something the add-on asserts.
Sources
- CAA — “Remote ID (RID)” policy programme
- CAA — “Remote ID (RID)” consumer page
- CAA — CAP3172 “Remote ID in the UK”
- CAA — “Class marks” page
- legislation.gov.uk — retained Regulation (EU) 2019/945, Annex Part 6
- legislation.gov.uk — The Unmanned Aircraft (Amendment) Regulations 2025 (S.I. 2025/1106)
Last verified 2026-09-10.