HALT, HASS and the standards: what each one actually requires

This guide summarizes each standard by number and revision, links to its issuer, and says where it fits. It summarizes and never replaces the standard: for the requirements themselves, read the document. The definitions of ESS, HALT and HASS are in What is ESS, HALT and HASS?, the procedure is in the methodology guide, and the choice between HALT and HASS is in HALT vs HASS.

The standards at a glance

MIL-STD-810H

MIL-STD-810H is the current revision, dated 31 January 2019, with Change 1 of 18 May 2022. It is a qualification standard: its methods define environmental profiles, representative of the service environment, that a product must survive to be considered qualified. The methods closest to HALT/HASS equipment are 514.8 (vibration), 503.7 (temperature shock) and 520.5 (combined environments). Issuer: DLA ASSIST.

HALT is not a qualification test, and MIL-STD-810H does not call for it. A repetitive-shock HALT table does not reproduce a tailored MIL-STD-810H vibration profile either: its GRMS values are not directly comparable to those of an electrodynamic shaker, as the methodology guide explains.

IEC 60068-2-14

IEC 60068-2-14 is Test N, change of temperature, in the IEC 60068 series of environmental tests. The current edition is 7.0, published in 2023. Like MIL-STD-810H, it is a qualification test with a defined profile and a pass/fail outcome. Issuer: IEC webstore.

IPC-9592B

IPC-9592B sets requirements for power conversion devices for the computer and telecommunications industries. Revision B is dated November 2012 and supersedes IPC-9592A (May 2010). It makes HALT a requirement for these devices, as part of design qualification testing (§5.2.3), and treats HASS as a route to reducing burn-in time: burn-in and HASS are the stress tests of manufacturing conformance testing (§7.3.2). Issuer: IPC.

GMW8287

GMW8287 is a GM Worldwide Engineering Standard; the current version is Issue 3, dated September 2017: “Highly Accelerated Life Testing (HALT), Highly Accelerated Stress Screening and Auditing (HASS/HASA)”. It is a guideline for performing HALT and HASS/HASA, and it gives a framework for qualifying a company’s HALT and HASS/HASA process through an audit. It applies to electronic and electromechanical assemblies, and may apply to some mechanical assemblies. Distributed by Accuris.

IEST-RP-PR003

IEST-RP-PR003, “HALT and HASS”, is the Institute of Environmental Sciences and Technology’s recommended practice for the two methods. First printed in September 2012, it was prepared by working group WG-PR003 of IEST’s Product Reliability Division. It covers the philosophy behind the methods, generic examples of methods, equipment differences, fixturing and lessons learned. It takes a qualitative approach, looking at the quality of the design and workmanship rather than calculating service life, and is used alongside a test specification rather than in place of one. Issuer: IEST.

MIL-HDBK-2164A and NAVMAT P-9492

Classical environmental stress screening (ESS), HASS’s predecessor, applied fixed profiles to every product regardless of what it was. MIL-STD-2164 covered the ESS process; it was canceled in January 1996 and replaced by the handbook MIL-HDBK-2164, revised as MIL-HDBK-2164A in June 1996. ASSIST has listed MIL-HDBK-2164A as inactive since 10 March 2025. NAVMAT P-9492, the Navy’s manufacturing screening program, is the best-known classical profile; its values are in What is ESS, HALT and HASS?. Issuer: DLA ASSIST, the MIL-STD-2164 and MIL-HDBK-2164 records.

Where Hanse chambers fit

Hanse’s VTC HALT/HASS chambers combine rapid thermal cycling and six-degree-of-freedom repetitive shock vibration in one chamber, and TC thermal chambers provide the thermal side alone. Hanse customers test to each of the standards above in Hanse chambers.