A study on smart seats for railroad vehicles was conducted using piezoelectric (PZT) sensors. For this purpose, the concept of passenger friendly smart seats was defined, and a PZT sensor was selected as the optimum sensor based on this concept. Using PZT sensors, simulation tests were performed using a sub-scale model railroad vehicle. In these tests, the main functions of the smart seats were extracted and simplified to improve the effectiveness of the simulation tests. Based on the test results, the system for smart seats proposed in this paper was successfully verified using PZT sensors and the dedicated operation software for the system. This paper will contribute to the improvement of services in high-speed rail systems through advances in ticket checking tasks.