The EU’s Right to Repair Directive (Directive (EU) 2024/1799) was a big win for our campaign. By 31 July 2026, all EU Member States are required to transpose the Directive into national law.
But a few days before this deadline, we see that not everyone in Europe will immediately enjoy the same right to repair from 1 August onwards. In this blogpost, we will clarify the expected timeline for the measures of the Directive and to which products the “right to repair” will apply.
Many countries are still catching up
At the time of writing (July 30), only a handful of Member States have formally notified the European Commission that they have completed transposition of the Directive1. A few others have published draft legislation or are well advanced in the legislative process, but many are still behind.
This means that people across Europe are likely to experience different levels of protection to their right to repair depending on where they live until all Member States have fully implemented the new rules.
Some important measures will take much longer
Although Member States should transpose the Directive by 31 July 2026, some of its most relevant features will only become available over the coming years.
The Directive requires the creation of a European Repair Platform, bringing together national sections where people will be able to find repairers, refurbished goods sellers, community repair initiatives and other repair services. The European Commission must establish the common EU interface by 31 July 2027, and the platform will become fully operational by 1 January 2028.
Member States are also required to introduce at least one measure promoting repair, for example, repair vouchers. They must notify these measures to the Commission by 31 July 2029.
In other words, the legal framework enters into force this summer, but many of the tools that will make repair easier and more accessible will take longer to roll out.
The Directive does not apply to every product
One of the biggest misconceptions is that the Directive creates a right to repair for every broken product. It does not.
The Directive amends the EU sale-of-goods rules so that consumers receive at least an extra year of legal guarantee when they choose repair instead of replacement under warranty. This applies to all consumer products.
But, the obligation for manufacturers to provide timely and cost-effective repair and to make spare parts and tools available at a reasonable price only applies to products that are already covered by EU repairability requirements listed in Annex II of the Directive.
It’s important to mention as well that we don’t know whether spare parts and tools prices will be truly “reasonable”, and we’ll monitor this going forward, as there’s no clear definition in the Directive.
The products covered by the obligation to repair currently include:
- washing machines and washer-dryers
- dishwashers
- refrigerators
- electronic displays
- welding equipment
- servers and data storage products
- mobile phones, cordless phones and tablets
- tumble dryers
- e-bikes and e-scooters batteries (from 18 February 2027)
- local space heaters
What about vacuum cleaners?
While vacuum cleaners are included in Annex II, of the Right to Repair Directive, this mention is meaningless since the Ecodesign Regulation it refers to (Commission Regulation (EU) No 666/2013) doesn’t actually include any repairability requirements nor any list of spare parts to be made available. Therefore technically this product category can’t be said to be covered by the Directive. Vacuum cleaners will only be covered once a new ecodesign regulation covering them will come into effect (we don’t have a timeline for this to happen at the time of writing).
A table with an overview of the products covered can be found on our website “What’s My Right to Repair?”.
As new EU repairability rules are adopted for additional products, the scope of the Directive can expand. But for now, many everyday products are still outside its strongest provisions.
An important milestone, but not the finish line
The Right to Repair Directive represents one of the EU’s biggest advances for repair to date. It strengthens our ability to choose repair over replacement, supports the growth of the repair sector and embeds repair more firmly in European consumer and sustainability law.
However, it is not yet a universal right to repair. Its scope remains limited to specific product groups, implementation will vary across Member States, and several supporting measures are still years away.
For Right to Repair Europe, this Directive is an important milestone but not the end of the journey. To speed up expansion of the right to repair to a wider range of product categories, we’re advocating for “horizontal repairability requirements” to be approved for most consumer products, but this will take time. We will continue working with our members and policymakers to ensure the rules are implemented effectively, expanded to more products and backed by ambitious national measures that make repair the easy, affordable and obvious choice for everyone.