The law
What an implementing act is, and why it is not your deadline
An implementing act says how a party applies a law that already exists, and it never creates a passport duty for your product.
An implementing act sets uniform conditions for the application of a law that already exists. A delegated act adds new detail to a law, and it can create a new duty for one product group.
That difference decides your date for a digital product passport. A delegated act can move that date. An implementing act cannot.
If you read an implementing act as a deadline, you buy a passport too early
Two implementing acts on digital product passports now exist. Both are in force. Neither one requires a passport for any product.
A supplier may show you one of them as proof that the rule has arrived. Check the instrument yourself before you agree. If you agree too early, you pay for a passport system for years before any law reaches your product.
The test: a new duty means a delegated act
One difference separates the two instruments. An instrument that creates a new obligation for a named product group is a delegated act, and it sets your date. An instrument that settles how a party meets an obligation that already exists is an implementing act, and it does not set your date.
The title of the act names its type. Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2026/1736 carries the word implementing in its title.
| Question | Delegated act | Implementing act |
|---|---|---|
| Who adopts it | The European Commission | The European Commission |
| What it does | Adds new detail to the law | Sets uniform conditions to apply the law |
| Can it create a passport duty for your product | Yes | No |
| Does it set your compliance date | Yes | No |
| Example on this subject | None adopted for any product group | Implementing Decision (EU) 2026/1736 |
The law behind the passport is the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR). Read what a delegated act is for the instrument that does set dates. Read the legal basis for the full set of instruments.
The first live example cites the standards, and requires nothing
Commission Implementing Decision (EU) 2026/1736 is the first live example. It cites six European standards for digital product passports. The Decision entered into force on 15 July 2026.
Its legal basis is a European standardisation regulation, and not the ESPR. The ESPR appears in no citation of the Decision.
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Legal basis | Article 10(6) of Regulation (EU) No 1025/2012 |
| Source of the presumption of conformity | ESPR Article 41(2) |
| ESPR requirements the presumption covers | Articles 10 and 11 |
Name the six standards one by one, because the numbers have a gap:
- EN 18216, data exchange protocols
- EN 18219, unique identifiers
- EN 18220, data carriers
- EN 18221, data storage, archiving, and persistence
- EN 18222, application programming interfaces for product passport lifecycle management and searchability
- EN 18223, system interoperability
There is no EN 18217 and no EN 18218. A range from the lowest number to the highest names two documents that do not exist. The six standards gives the official title of each one.
The Decision gives a product built to a cited standard a presumption of conformity. The table above names the source of that presumption. The presumption has no practical effect for a product group until a delegated act requires a passport for that group.
The Decision does not mention ESPR Article 9. Article 9 is the article that makes a passport a condition of market access. So the Decision tells you how to build a passport. It does not tell you that you need one. A harmonised standard also stays voluntary after citation. The text sits in the Official Journal.
The second live example governs the registry, and still binds nobody
The registry is a separate subject and a separate instrument. ESPR Article 13(1) required a digital registry by 19 July 2026. The Commission launched the registry one day later, together with a testing environment. The registry is operational, and a database is not a legal act.
Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/1778 governs the registry. It entered into force on 6 August 2026, and it does create registration duties. Even so, no operator must register a passport yet. Article 8(1) of that act covers products under the ecodesign regulation. It ties the registration to the level that a delegated act under Article 4 sets, and it names no product of its own.
This site searched the Official Journal and the Commission product group pages. No adopted delegated act came back. So the duty exists, and it reaches nobody.
That makes this act the clearest example on the site. An instrument that is in force is not the same as a duty that reaches you. See the EU registry.
The two implementing acts are separate instruments
Warning: do not treat the standards Decision and the registry act as one instrument. Some summaries join them. They have different numbers, different subjects and different dates.
| Instrument | Subject | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Implementing Decision (EU) 2026/1736 | Cites the six passport standards | In force since 15 July 2026 |
| Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/1778 | The EU passport registry | Adopted 16 July 2026, published 17 July 2026. In force since 6 August 2026. |
This page carried two wrong dates until 15 August 2026. It gave the adoption date as the publication date, and it called the entry into force date an application date.
This site has now read the full registry act
This site has read the recitals, every article and the footnotes of the registry act. The act has no annex.
The numbering runs from Article 1 to Article 24. The act also carries an Article 6a, on the transfer of a registered passport. So it holds 25 articles under 24 numbers.
The EU registry sets out what the act requires, and what it does not require yet. The source register lists what this site still has not read.
A future implementing act will not move your date either
The battery regulation gives a planned example. That law is Regulation (EU) 2023/1542, and it sets one deadline for the Commission itself. Implementing acts must say who counts as a person with a legitimate interest in the battery passport data.
This site searched the Official Journal, the Commission comitology register and the Commission planning register on 15 August 2026. It found no adopted act, and no draft act before the committee that must vote on one.
The Commission's own planning record puts a battery access rights implementing act in the last quarter of 2026. That record is an indicative plan, not an adopted act, and it is later than the date the law sets.
| Item | Article | Date | What the date is |
|---|---|---|---|
| The battery passport duty | Article 77(1) | 18 February 2027 | The date the duty starts |
| The access rights implementing acts | Article 77(9) | 18 August 2026 | The deadline for the Commission to adopt them |
Access rights, which decide who may read a field, do not decide who needs a passport. The battery passport duty covers three categories:
- each light means of transport (LMT) battery, such as an e-bike battery
- each industrial battery with a capacity greater than 2 kilowatt hours
- each electric vehicle battery
See batteries for that duty, and who can see what for the access question.
Only a delegated act reaches your product group
The ESPR creates no passport duty for any specific product. The duty arrives through a product-group delegated act adopted under Article 4. As at August 2026 the Commission has adopted no such act for any group.
Take a merino jumper. No implementing act can make that jumper need a passport. Only a textile delegated act can do that, and none is adopted.
A delegated act also carries a delay before it applies. Two steps run before the date of application.
| Step | Rule | Length |
|---|---|---|
| Scrutiny | ESPR Article 72(6) | Two months. Parliament or Council may extend it by two more months. |
| Transition | ESPR Article 4(4) | At least 18 months from entry into force |
The text of Article 4(4) allows exceptions. Treat the transition period as the usual case, and not as a guarantee.
How to read the timeline does the arithmetic for each sector, and which products and when lists the product groups.
Wait for your own delegated act, unless you sell a battery
Warning: do not start a passport project because an implementing act appeared in the news.
- Read the title of any instrument a supplier shows you.
- Ask which product group the instrument names. Neither act above names one.
- Wait for the delegated act for your own product group.
- If you sell a battery in one of the three categories, work to February 2027.
If you export from New Zealand, also read what this means for New Zealand exporters. Your European importer places the product on the EU market. That importer will ask you for data before any act binds you.