What is a digital product passport for furniture exactly?
A digital product passport is a collection of data about a furniture product that can be accessed via a QR code or comparable carrier: what it is made of, how to repair or recycle it, and who brought it to the market. The passport itself is not on the product, but online; the QR code is only the gateway to that information. The idea comes from the European Ecodesign Regulation for Sustainable Products (ESPR), which prescribes such passports for an increasing number of product groups.
For furniture, that is not yet definitively regulated. The ESPR itself is already in force, but the detailed rules for furniture specifically — what exactly must be in the passport, which furniture it applies to and from when — come in a separate delegated act still to be published. According to the European Commission's work plan, that is expected around 2028, with an obligation that does not kick in immediately after that. As long as that act is not in place, there is therefore a clear framework within which this will take place, but no fixed date on which it becomes mandatory for you.
Why is there a passport for furniture
The idea behind the ESPR is that products last longer, are easier to repair and are better reused or recycled at the end of their life. To be able to assess that — by a buyer, a recycler or a supervisor — information about the product must be findable somewhere, in a fixed, comparable form. That is the function of the passport: not a new quality mark, but a standardised way to disclose existing product information.
Furniture is one of the product groups that the Commission has put on its work plan, alongside for example textiles and electronics. This means that specific requirements will come that fit with how furniture is made, sold and used — different from, for example, a washing machine or a pair of jeans. Which furniture exactly falls under the rules and what exemptions there are is not yet fixed; that is exactly the kind of detail that is worked out in the delegated act.
What is likely to be included
Even before the final rules are in place, it is possible to deduce from the broader ESPR system and from comparable processes for other product groups which types of data often recur: material composition, origin of components, repair and maintenance information, and data on recyclability at the end of the product's life. The identity of the party bringing the product to the European market — the so-called supplier — also typically belongs in the passport in most schemes. However, what is exactly mandatory for furniture remains open until the delegated act is published.
How the data reaches the user
The QR code is the link between the physical piece of furniture and the online data. Scan the code and the browser opens a page with the passport data for that specific product or product line. What is important is that that page must remain accessible for years, even if the company that made the furniture has since been taken over, ceased operations or switched software supplier. With existing product passports in other sectors, a retention period of several years after the sale of the last item is therefore often used. How that hosting is arranged in practice and why it is more than just a link on a website, you can read in the explanation of how we host the data.
What this means for your business, even if the date is not yet fixed
Even without a fixed implementation date, it is worthwhile to already know whether your products will fall under these rules and who in your chain must supply which data. If you wait until the delegated act is published, there will be little time left to get data in order that sometimes sits years back in the production process. An initial orientation on your own situation can already with a few questions in the free product scan. If you would like to carefully read through the background of the regulation and the concepts used, you will find them worked out per topic in the knowledge base.
It remains important to distinguish between what is already established in the ESPR itself and what still needs to be worked out in a delegated act. We update this page as soon as new official texts appear; for questions that specifically affect your company, a lawyer or the competent supervisory authority is the appropriate contact point.
If you are curious whether and how this will apply to your products, take the free quick scan or browse through the topics in the frequently asked questions to see which question comes closest to your situation.