For a few years now, the EU has been setting out what manufacturers have to do so that a device stays repairable. That sounds like Brussels, and yet it's something you notice at the shop counter.
When people talk about the “right to repair”, they usually mean two different things. Both affect your phone, but in different places.
The first is the ecodesign rules. They tell manufacturers how a device has to be built and which spare parts and information they have to provide.
The second is the Repair Directive. It sets out your rights as a buyer, in other words what you can demand from the manufacturer when something breaks.
Directive (EU) 2024/1799 is titled “on promoting the repair of goods”. It is aimed at manufacturers, not at the repair shop around the corner.
The Bundestag passed the implementing law on 25 June 2026. It writes the directive's requirements into German law.
Two points from it are the ones you're most likely to notice yourself.
Since 20 June 2025, smartphones and tablets have had their own ecodesign regulation. This is the part that has directly changed our work.
A spare part is of little use if the software doesn't play along afterwards. That is exactly what decides whether a part works fully after it has been fitted, or whether a function stays switched off.
This topic has its own name and its own article: parts pairing. There you can read how the pairing works technically and what it means in individual cases.
The practical difference is in the spare parts. The more reliably manufacturers deliver, the less often we have to tell you that there's nothing available for your model right now.
We take in every model. With older devices, though, not every spare part is always available straight away. Even the best regulation can't change that when a model has been off the market for years.
What the rules don't cover is the price. What a repair costs is still decided by the market. With us, you hear the price before we start.
So that nobody ends up with the wrong expectations, here is the other side of it.
This article sums up what the rules say and how they play out in our workshop. It is not legal advice.
If money or a dispute with the manufacturer is involved, ask someone whose job it is. The consumer advice centre (Verbraucherzentrale) is the first place to go.
There are EU repairability requirements for mobile phones and tablets, and the claim against the manufacturer is based on them. Outside the statutory warranty, it isn't free. How to enforce such a claim in your specific case is something a consumer advice centre can tell you better than we can.
Not directly. The rules are about repairability and defects, not about damage you caused yourself. Indirectly, yes: the better spare parts are available, the more likely it is that a drop damage can be repaired at a sensible price at all.
The ecodesign rules for smartphones apply to devices newly placed on the market since June 2025. We'll still repair your older device as long as the spare part exists. Bring it in and we'll take a look.
Since June 2025, the EU energy label for smartphones shows a repairability class. What it measures and what it doesn't, we've written up in a separate article.
Your question isn't here? Call us on 0211 26134549 or send us a repair request.
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