Brussels Carves Out the Wearables
The European Commission has adopted exemptions to its battery regulation that spare six new categories of electronics from carrying user-replaceable batteries, wearables among them. The EU started enforcing its Batteries Regulation in 2023 as part of the European Green Deal, though the replaceable battery requirement does not bite until 2027. That rule has already pushed Nintendo into announcing a Switch 2 revision with a user-replaceable battery. Smartwatch makers will not have to follow.
Key Takeaways
- Wearables, certain medical devices, electronic toys, portable thermometers, telematics devices and equipment for explosive atmospheres are exempt from user-replaceable battery requirements.
- The Commission defines wearables as smartwatches, fitness trackers, smart glasses or other electronic devices integrated into clothing and accessories, and many will still need to be repairable by a trained professional.
- Smartphones remain covered, though the rule already permits replacements needing no specialised tools, or specialised tools supplied by the maker, provided safety is not compromised.
The exempted list covers wearable devices, certain medical devices, electronic toys, portable thermometers, roof-mounted telematics devices and devices designed for use in “explosive atmospheres.” On what counts as a wearable, the Commission names smartwatches, fitness trackers, smart glasses and other electronic devices integrated into clothing and other accessories. These devices escape the user-replaceable requirement, but many will still have to be repairable by a trained professional. Wireless earbuds are not named in the text, yet products like Apple’s AirPods may land inside the exemption as “wearable devices for which the safety, durability, or water resistance may be compromised by user access to the battery.”
Phones Stay In
Smartphones are not exempt. The regulation as it stands already allows battery repairs that fall short of popping off a back cover and slotting in a new cell. Provided replacements need no specialised tools, or the maker supplies those tools, and provided the swap does not affect the phone’s safety, the EU permits it. Apple’s Self Service Repair programme appears to qualify.
With the exemptions adopted, they go to the European Parliament and the Council of the EU for scrutiny. Assuming nobody objects, they take effect 20 days after publication in the Official Journal of the EU.
What the Rule Was Meant to Do
When the EU adopted the regulation, it was framed as part of building a greener, circular economy. Forcing companies to ship devices with replaceable batteries “will extend the life of these products before their final disposal, will encourage re-use and will contribute to the reduction of post-consumer waste,” the Commission wrote at the time. Attempts at similar protections in the US have gone less smoothly. California, Minnesota, New York and Oregon run their own right-to-repair laws, while a federal rule has been largely abandoned.
The Commission’s reasoning is narrower than the headlines suggest, and worth stating plainly. Batteries in exempt wearables must still be removable and replaceable, just by independent professionals rather than owners. The delegated act was adopted on 14 July and follows a public consultation and discussions with consumer associations, industry and member states, extending logic already applied to wet appliances like electric toothbrushes. Open a compact sealed enclosure, fail to reseal it properly, let water in, and you have created a lithium-ion hazard on someone’s wrist. The general rule that portable batteries must be consumer-replaceable stands untouched for everything else.
Repair advocates read the same facts differently, and the timing gives them material. The exemption arrives after the US ambassador to the EU publicly criticised the battery rules, which reportedly held up the European rollout of Meta’s smart glasses. Asked about that, a Commission spokesperson said it “has not given in to anyone’s pressure” and that the act is not about regulating one specific product. Whether that holds up depends on how Parliament reads it during scrutiny. Either way, one deadline moves regardless: the EU’s Right to Repair Directive takes effect on 31 July 2026, requiring repairs at reasonable prices, spare parts and manuals, and banning software that blocks repair, including parts-pairing that locks battery swaps to first-party components.
The pressure on sealed hardware has not gone away, only redirected. Apple is reportedly redesigning the Apple Pencil Pro’s battery system for 2027 because a stylus qualifies for neither the water-resistance nor the battery-retention carve-outs that shelter phones and tablets, and every generation so far has failed repairability ratings thanks to heavy adhesive. That rule reaches keyboards, mice, headphones and other accessories too. The precedent everyone cites is USB-C, where Apple redesigned the iPhone 15 for Europe and the world got the port. Wearables were the test of whether that pattern repeats automatically. It did not.
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