You may have seen EOBD or EOBD2. OBD in both abbreviations stands for on board diagnostics. But, what is EOBD? and What is EOBD2?
First off, EOBD stands for European On-Board Diagnostics. All gasoline cars sold in Europe since 2001, and diesel cars made since 2003, have on-board diagnostic systems to monitor engine emissions.
OBD1 (the first generation of onboard diagnostics system) was the early emission control and engine management system. Because of lack of standardization in this systems each manufacturers use different OBD port so many different shape of adapter for scan tools were necessary. (even between car models from the same manufacture)
The next generation of the system (OBD2) have been developed in the U.S.. The OBD2 apply to all cars sold in the U.S. and manufacured since 1996.
EOBD is the European version of American OBD2, which applies to gasoline cars sold in Europe since 2001 (and diesel cars since 2004).
All those cars must also have a standard EOBD port, the same one as American OBD2 port.
However, EOBD2 is not a second generation of EOBD.
While EOBD stands for ‘European On-Board Diagnostics’, EOBD2 actually stands for Enhanced On-Board Diagnostics, 2nd Generation.
EOBD2 has manufacturer-specific features available on some OBDII/EOBD tools to get additional information or perform diagnostic tests. EOBD2 features are normally manufacturer-specific, and will usually only be available for a certain car manufacturer. But that depends on types of scan tools you use as well as on cars you are working on.
You can use OBD2 scan tools to get trouble codes or basic parameters from EOBD2 equipped cars. EOBD2 is capable of showing more information and being performed additional tests, depending on scan tools.