Recently, the advanced driver assistance system (ADAS), which helps mitigate car accidents, has been developed using environmental detection sensors, such as long and short range radar, lidar, wide dynamic range cameras, ultrasonic sensors and laser scanners. Among these detection sensors, radars can quickly provide drivers with reliable information about the velocity, distance and direction of a target obstacle, as well as information about the vehicle in changing weather conditions. In the adaptive cruise control system (ACCS), three radar sensors are usually needed because two short range radars are used to detect objects in the adjacent lane and one long range radar is used to detect objects in-path. In this paper, low-cost radar based on a single sensor, which can detect objects in both the adjacent lane and in-path, is proposed for use in the ACCS. Before designing the proposed radar, we analyzed the world-wide radar technology and market trends for ACCS. Based on this analysis, we designed a novel radar sensor for the ACCS using radar components, such as an antenna, transceiver module, transceiver control module and signal processing algorithm. Finally, target detection experiments were conducted. In the experimental results, the proposed single radar can successfully complete the detection required for the ACCS. In the conclusion, the perspective and issues in the future development of the ACCS radar are described.