ABSTRACT This paper proposes Enhanced Intelligent Driver Model for Adaptive Cruise Control (EIDM-ACC) vehicles, a novel car-following model that dynamically adjusts desired speed and considers acceleration inertia. The EIDM-ACC model is compared with two widely used models for simulating ACC vehicles – the ACC model developed by the PATH Project (PATH-ACC) at the University of California Transportation Institute and Continuous Asymmetric Optimal Velocity Relative Velocity (CAOVRV) model. Three models are calibrated and cross-validated using real vehicle trajectory data from the OpenACC dataset. Results show that the EIDM-ACC outperforms the other two models in small and large fluctuation stages. In addition, EIDM-ACC has better performance in capturing the instability and energy consumption of ACC vehicles, and also has advantages over the other two models in terms of safety.