80% of phones flout EU repairability rules, and no one's checking

Since June 2025, EU rules require smartphones and tablets sold in the bloc to carry a repairability score and publish information that helps owners fix their devices. A review by Right to Repair Europe of the EU’s energy-labelling product registry (EPREL) found the mandate is being widely ignored: of 2,334 smartphone models examined, only about 18% actually linked to spare-parts pricing or repair instructions. Roughly half left the required URL fields blank, and another 19% pointed to pages with no relevant repair information — in some cases even routing buyers to Temu or AliExpress listings.

The core problem is that manufacturers self-report these scores with no public authority verifying the declared data, so vendors hand themselves top marks while omitting the underlying documentation. Even brands that technically comply, such as Apple and Samsung, bury pricing behind layers of clicks, and where figures do exist they can be uselessly vague — one battery was listed at anywhere from €14 to €128. iFixit’s Thomas Opsomer called the publicly-available-pricing obligation a genuine step forward but argued it is meaningless without enforcement and a requirement that makers publish the full evidence behind their scores.

The findings matter because the regulation’s consumer benefit hinges entirely on data that is currently neither validated nor, in most cases, provided. Pressure will only grow: from February 2027, a further EU rule will require user-replaceable batteries in most new mobile devices, with narrow exceptions for wearables — a mandate that will be similarly toothless if the enforcement gap exposed here isn’t closed first.