J1939/82 specifies a set of compliance tests for J1939 protocol stacks and applications. Compliance testing is recommended but not manditory.

There is around 130 tests total, which test from the data link to the application layers. There are tests to validate address encoding, multi-frame fragmentation, request processing, and address claiming.

The purpose of these compliance tests is to generate one or more verification documents that outline the data needed to assure that an ECU is designed to operate as a node on a SAE J1939 network. These tests are to allow testing of a Device to determine self-compliance by the manufacturer of a device. The manufacturer can use its record of what procedures were run successfully to show the level of compliance with J1939.