diff --git a/selfdrive/modeld/models/commonmodel_pyx.pyx b/selfdrive/modeld/models/commonmodel_pyx.pyx
index e292bb0d2..ecbe644e0 100644
--- a/selfdrive/modeld/models/commonmodel_pyx.pyx
+++ b/selfdrive/modeld/models/commonmodel_pyx.pyx
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 # distutils: language = c++
-# cython: c_string_encoding=ascii
+# cython: c_string_encoding=ascii, language_level=3
 
 import numpy as np
 cimport numpy as cnp
diff --git a/selfdrive/modeld/runners/runmodel_pyx.pyx b/selfdrive/modeld/runners/runmodel_pyx.pyx
index e1b201a6a..12b8ec10f 100644
--- a/selfdrive/modeld/runners/runmodel_pyx.pyx
+++ b/selfdrive/modeld/runners/runmodel_pyx.pyx
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 # distutils: language = c++
-# cython: c_string_encoding=ascii
+# cython: c_string_encoding=ascii, language_level=3
 
 from libcpp.string cimport string
 
diff --git a/selfdrive/modeld/runners/snpemodel_pyx.pyx b/selfdrive/modeld/runners/snpemodel_pyx.pyx
index c3b2b7e9b..f83b7c8cf 100644
--- a/selfdrive/modeld/runners/snpemodel_pyx.pyx
+++ b/selfdrive/modeld/runners/snpemodel_pyx.pyx
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 # distutils: language = c++
-# cython: c_string_encoding=ascii
+# cython: c_string_encoding=ascii, language_level=3
 
 import os
 from libcpp cimport bool
diff --git a/selfdrive/modeld/runners/thneedmodel_pyx.pyx b/selfdrive/modeld/runners/thneedmodel_pyx.pyx
index 53487afa1..6f8fdd255 100644
--- a/selfdrive/modeld/runners/thneedmodel_pyx.pyx
+++ b/selfdrive/modeld/runners/thneedmodel_pyx.pyx
@@ -1,5 +1,5 @@
 # distutils: language = c++
-# cython: c_string_encoding=ascii
+# cython: c_string_encoding=ascii, language_level=3
 
 from libcpp cimport bool
 from libcpp.string cimport string