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U.S. Army To Invest in XM30 in 2026 to Develop Next-Generation Infantry Fighting Vehicle Prototypes.
The U.S. Army will continue advancing its XM30 Combat Vehicle program in Fiscal Year 2026 with roughly $386.4 million in research and development funding requested by the Department of Defense. The investment keeps the Bradley replacement on schedule, pushing the program from early design work into detailed engineering and prototype integration without yet committing to production.
The U.S. Army's ground modernization strategy advances decisively in Fiscal Year 2026 with a continued infusion of development funds for the XM30 Combat Vehicle program. The Department of Defense’s FY2026 budget request, released in July 2025, allocates approximately $386.4 million in Research, Development, Test, and Evaluation (RDT&E) for XM30, sustaining momentum for the Bradley replacement effort without initiating procurement. This funding supports the transition from Preliminary Design Review (PDR) to Critical Design Review (CDR), marking a pivotal shift from concept development to hands-on prototyping and integration.
Concept models based on Rheinmetall’s Lynx KF41 and General Dynamics’ Griffin III are shown for illustrative purposes only and do not represent the final XM30 design (Picture source: Army Recognition Group / General Dynamics)
FY2026 marks a technically intensive phase for XM30, with Army officials prioritizing validation of the vehicle’s system architecture, lethality suite, and digital backbone. The year’s efforts will focus on refining survivability components and command-and-control interfaces tailored for integration with robotic combat vehicles and autonomous systems. Army Futures Command has insisted on an open systems approach for the XM30, ensuring it can evolve in sync with unmanned platforms, electronic warfare, and AI-enabled targeting, capabilities aligned with the Army’s vision for multi-domain operations.
Following the June 2025 Milestone B approval, FY2026 represents the program’s first full execution year under the system development and demonstration phase. The schedule now targets a Milestone C decision in early FY2028, placing current efforts at the critical midpoint between architectural validation and production readiness. This period is also influenced by the broader Army Transformation Initiative, which has placed institutional pressure on programs like XM30 to accelerate integration timelines for next-generation maneuver formations.
While no production contract has yet been awarded, the XM30 Combat Vehicle program remains in a competitive development phase featuring two industry teams, General Dynamics Land Systems, offering a platform derived from its Griffin III design, and American Rheinmetall Vehicles, developing a variant based on the Lynx KF41. Both concepts were selected during the Army’s 2023 preliminary design downselection and are now being refined under firm-fixed-price contracts to support the program’s system development and demonstration phase. Although a prime integrator has not been named, both vendors continue to engineer mission systems, digital architecture, and lethality upgrades tailored to XM30 requirements.
The $386 million in FY2026 RDT&E funding sustains this dual-path approach, preserving the Army’s ability to compare and validate competing solutions before committing to a production path. By keeping two advanced platforms in contention, the Army maintains strategic leverage over integration timelines, affordability metrics, and capability trade-offs, particularly in survivability, autonomous teaming, and sensor fusion. With Critical Design Reviews planned for FY2026, the program is poised to transition to prototype fabrication and integrated system trials in FY2027, leading toward a Milestone C decision in early FY2028.
With nearly $1.5 billion cumulatively invested in XM30 since FY2023, the FY2026 budget solidifies the vehicle’s role as the cornerstone of the Army’s future armored formations. The transition to physical testing and subsystem integration confirms XM30’s elevation from concept to reality, placing it on track to reshape the Army’s brigade combat team structure for the next generation of warfare.