PPAP Submission Levels 1 Through 5: What Each Level Requires and How Your Customer Decides Which One You Submit
Two suppliers can complete the exact same PPAP work and send the customer two completely different packages. One sends a single signed warrant. The other sends a warrant plus a full binder of dimensional results, material certifications, capability studies, and measurement system analysis. Neither one is wrong. They were told to submit at different levels.
This is the part of the Production Part Approval Process that trips up quality engineers who learned PPAP as "the 18 elements." The 18 elements define the work you have to complete. The submission level defines how much of that work you physically send to the customer versus retain at your own facility. Confuse the two and you either flood the SQE with data they never asked for, or you submit a bare warrant when the customer expected the full data package and the part sits in submitted status while your launch date slides.
This post walks the five PPAP submission levels as they are defined in the AIAG PPAP 4th Edition, what each level requires you to submit, how the customer designates the level, and how to read the Submission and Retention Requirements table so your package matches the request the first time.
Submit Versus Retain: The Distinction the Levels Actually Control
Start with the rule that makes the rest of the levels make sense. Regardless of submission level, you complete and retain all applicable PPAP elements.
The default AIAG PPAP has 18 elements. Design records, engineering change documents, customer engineering approval, Design FMEA, process flow diagram, Process FMEA, control plan, measurement systems analysis studies, dimensional results, records of material and performance tests, initial process studies, qualified laboratory documentation, appearance approval report, sample production parts, master sample, checking aids, customer specific requirements, and the Part Submission Warrant. Every element that applies to your part gets completed and stored in your PPAP file before you claim the part is approved. That work does not change with the level.
What the submission level controls is which of those completed elements you place in front of the customer at submission time, and which ones you keep on the shelf ready to produce on request. A Level 1 submission is not less work than a Level 3 submission. It is the same work with a different amount of paper crossing the customer's desk. When an SQE audits a Level 1 supplier, every retained element still has to exist. The level is a submission instruction, not a scope reduction.
Hold that distinction and the five levels read cleanly.
The Five Levels, Element by Element
The AIAG PPAP 4th Edition defines five submission levels. Here is what each one puts in front of the customer.
Level 1: Warrant Only
At Level 1 you submit the Part Submission Warrant to the customer. For designated appearance items you also submit the Appearance Approval Report. Everything else stays in your retained PPAP file.
Level 1 is common for low risk, high maturity situations. Catalog hardware, a carryover part moving to a second identical line, a supplier with a long clean history on a mature commodity. The customer trusts the supplier to have done the work and only wants the signed warrant on record. Level 1 is not a shortcut for a brand new part with real launch risk. When you see Level 1 designated, confirm it is a deliberate customer choice and not a default someone assumed.
Level 2: Warrant With Product Samples and Limited Supporting Data
At Level 2 you submit the warrant, product samples, and a limited set of supporting data. Limited is defined by the customer, but it typically means a subset such as the dimensional results and one or two material or performance test records, not the complete package.
Level 2 sits between the bare warrant of Level 1 and the full binder of Level 3. It shows up when the customer wants physical parts in hand and enough evidence to spot check, without asking for the entire data set. Because limited is customer defined, this is the level where a quick email to the SQE clarifying exactly which records they want saves a rejected submission.
Level 3: Warrant With Product Samples and Complete Supporting Data
At Level 3 you submit the warrant, product samples, and complete supporting data. This is the default level. When the customer does not specify a level, submit at Level 3.
Complete supporting data means the full set of applicable elements: dimensional results against a ballooned print, material and performance test records with certifications, the measurement systems analysis studies that qualify the gauges behind those dimensions, the initial process capability study, the control plan, the process flow, the Process FMEA, and the rest of the applicable elements. Level 3 is the workhorse of automotive PPAP. New parts, new tooling, new suppliers, and safety or regulatory characteristics almost always submit at Level 3 because the customer wants to see the complete evidence trail before authorizing production shipments.
If you only build one PPAP package format well, build the Level 3 format, because it is what most launches require and every other level is a subset of it.
Level 4: Warrant and Other Requirements as Defined by the Customer
Level 4 is the customer defined level. You submit the warrant and whatever specific requirements the customer names. There is no fixed content list, because the point of Level 4 is that the customer specifies a package that does not match the standard Level 1, 2, 3, or 5 pattern.
Level 4 shows up when a customer has a house PPAP standard that pulls a particular combination of elements, or when a specific characteristic drives an unusual evidence request. Do not guess at Level 4 content. The designation itself is an instruction to go read the customer specific requirement that defines the package. If you cannot find that definition, that is the finding to raise before you build anything.
Level 5: Warrant With Product Samples and Complete Supporting Data Reviewed at the Supplier Location
Level 5 requires the same complete data package as Level 3, but the review happens at your manufacturing location rather than by shipping the package to the customer. The warrant, the product samples, and the complete supporting data are made available for review at the supplier's site, typically with the customer SQE on the floor.
Level 5 is the on site review level. It shows up for high risk parts, new suppliers the customer wants to see in person, or situations where the customer wants to walk the process alongside the data. The content burden matches Level 3. The difference is logistics and presence: the evidence has to be assembled, current, and ready to defend in a room with the customer, not mailed in a binder. Level 5 rewards suppliers whose documents actually reconcile to each other, because an SQE reviewing on site will pull the control plan, ask to see the gauge that measures a given characteristic, ask for that gauge's MSA study, and follow the thread live.
Who Sets the Level and How to Confirm It
The customer designates the submission level. It is not the supplier's choice. The level comes from the customer specific requirements, the program launch documents, the purchase order language, or a direct instruction from the customer SQE.
When the level is not specified, the AIAG default is Level 3. That default is a safety net, not an invitation to assume. If your program documents are silent on the level, the right move is to confirm with the SQE rather than quietly submitting a Level 1 warrant and hoping. The cost of asking is one email. The cost of guessing wrong is a rejected submission and a launch delay.
The level can also change across the life of a part. A part that submitted at Level 3 for its original launch might move to Level 1 for a minor change resubmission, or jump to Level 5 if quality history on the part has been rough and the customer wants an on site review. Read the level for the specific submission in front of you. Do not carry the last submission's level forward by habit.
Reading the Submission and Retention Requirements Table
The PPAP manual publishes a Submission and Retention Requirements table that maps each element against each level. For every element it tells you one of three things: submit it to the customer and retain a copy, retain it at your location and have it available on request, or retain and submit only if the customer asks.
Learn to read that table as the authority, because memory and habit drift. The table is where you confirm, for example, that the design record and the warrant get submitted at Level 3, while the checking aids records are retained and available on request rather than shipped. When you build a package, walk the table element by element against the designated level and sort every completed element into submit or retain. That mechanical pass is what stops the two failure modes: over submitting data the customer did not want, and under submitting an element the level actually required.
The table is also the answer to the question that comes up on every audit: "You submitted at Level 1, where is your dimensional data?" The retained element exists in your file exactly because the table told you to complete and retain it even though Level 1 did not require you to submit it. The level governed the submission. The table governed the retention. Both were satisfied.
The Significant Production Run Behind the Parts
Whatever level you submit, the parts and the data behind a PPAP have to come from a significant production run. The AIAG default is a run of one to eight hours of production with a specific quantity, a minimum of 300 consecutive parts, unless the customer specifies otherwise.
The run has to use production tooling, production gauging, the production process, production materials, production operators, and the production environment. Parts made on a prototype cell with a soft tool and a hand measurement do not qualify, even if the dimensions are perfect. The point of the significant production run is that the PPAP evidence reflects the process that will actually make production parts, at the rate it will make them. When an SQE reviews initial process capability at Level 3 or Level 5, they are reading a study that has to come from that qualified run, not from a cherry picked prototype batch.
If the customer specifies a different run quantity or duration, that specification wins over the default. This is another place to read the customer specific requirement rather than defaulting to 300 pieces on autopilot.
Submission Status: What Approval Actually Means
After you submit at the designated level, the customer returns one of three dispositions on the warrant: approved, interim approval, or rejected.
Approved means the part meets all customer requirements and you are authorized to ship production quantities against releases. Interim approval authorizes shipment for a limited time or quantity under an agreed action plan, usually because one element is not yet fully satisfied, for example a capability study that needs more data or a corrective action that is in progress. Interim approval has an expiration and a documented plan to reach full approval. It is not a place to park a part indefinitely. Rejected means the package or the parts do not meet requirements and the submission has to be corrected and resubmitted.
The level you submit at does not change these three outcomes, but it does change how quickly the customer can reach them. A complete, well organized Level 3 package that reconciles across elements gets to approved faster than a package where the reviewer has to chase missing records. A Level 5 on site review with documents that contradict each other turns into a day of findings. The level sets the venue. The quality of the evidence sets the speed.
Where a Connected Document Model Changes the Math
The submission levels expose how much a PPAP package depends on the underlying documents reconciling to each other. At Level 3 and Level 5 the customer sees the complete data set, and the complete data set is only credible when the dimensional results trace to the ballooned print, the gauges in the dimensional results trace to their MSA studies, the special characteristics trace from the Process FMEA into the control plan, and the whole set carries consistent revisions.
When those elements live as separate spreadsheets that only line up at submission time, the reconciliation is manual and the gaps surface in front of the customer. When they live as a connected model where a revision to a characteristic propagates through the linked artifacts, the package holds together by design and a Level 5 on site review stops being a scramble.
That is the design behind QualityEngineer.ai. The PPAP package workflow assembles the applicable elements in submission order and runs gap analysis before the warrant goes out, so you know which elements are complete and which are missing before the SQE does. The APQP workflow feeds the upstream deliverables that become PPAP elements, Blueprint Intelligence seeds the characteristic list from the print so the dimensional plan traces back to the drawing, and the statistical tools produce the capability and measurement system studies that Level 3 and Level 5 packages have to include. The supplier evaluation workflow tracks the quality history that customers weigh when they decide whether a part submits at Level 1 or gets pulled up to Level 5.
The submission level is the customer's call. Whether your package is ready to defend at that level is yours.
Related Reading
- What is PPAP? A Complete Guide for Quality Engineers for the foundational walkthrough of the process the levels sit inside
- PPAP 18 Elements Checklist for the element by element content that every level draws from
- FAI vs PPAP: When You Need Each and How They Overlap for the aerospace and automotive comparison on first article versus part approval
- PPAP Software: How Purpose Built Tools Reduce Submission Rework for the tooling case behind a package that reconciles across elements
- Cpk vs Ppk: Which Process Capability Index to Use for PPAP for the initial process study evidence that Level 3 and Level 5 packages require
- Gauge R&R Acceptance Criteria for the measurement systems analysis that qualifies the gauges behind the dimensional results
- APQP 3rd Edition Transition for how the upstream APQP deliverables feed the PPAP elements you submit
About the Author
Daniel Crouse is the founder of QualityEngineer.ai and has spent 15 plus years in supplier quality, PPAP, and manufacturing systems. He built QualityEngineer.ai because quality engineers deserve better tools than Excel.
