The Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation — ESPR, Regulation (EU) 2024/1781 — is the EU framework law behind the Digital Product Passport. It entered into force in July 2024 and replaces the older Ecodesign Directive, widening the scope from energy-related products to almost every physical product sold in the EU.
ESPR is a framework: it does not, by itself, regulate any single product. It gives the Commission the power to set ecodesign requirements — product group by product group — covering durability, reusability, reparability, recycled content, energy and resource efficiency, and substances of concern. It adds three things beyond the old Ecodesign Directive: the Digital Product Passport, a ban on destroying unsold consumer goods (textiles and footwear first), and mandatory green public-procurement criteria.
Almost all physical goods placed on the EU market are in scope. The main exclusions are food, feed and medicinal products. Unlike the directive it replaces — limited to energy-related products — ESPR reaches textiles, furniture, steel, tyres, chemicals and more. The Commission decides which groups to regulate first through a working plan.
Because ESPR is a framework, the detail for each product group arrives in a separate delegated act. That act fixes the exact ecodesign requirements, the passport data set, the granularity level and the date the obligation starts. This is why there is no single "DPP deadline": the framework is already law, and each act switches on one group. The deadline table shows what is scheduled.
The Commission's first ESPR working plan names the priority groups for the initial delegated acts. It focuses on textiles and apparel, iron and steel, aluminium, furniture including mattresses, and tyres, alongside several energy-related product groups. Batteries are handled separately under the EU Battery Regulation, whose passport is the first to become mandatory — 18 February 2027.
If you make, brand or import a physical product for the EU market that is not food, feed or medicine, ESPR will reach it — the only questions are which delegated act applies and when. With the framework in force and the registry open, the sensible move is to find your group's status and start structuring the data. The free readiness check maps your products to their regulations in two minutes.
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