EU AI Act status: July 2026
The short version: the Digital Omnibus on AI is now law. It was published in the Official Journal on July 24, 2026 as Regulation (EU) 2026/1744 and entered into force on July 27, 2026. The August 2, 2026 transparency deadline was not moved. The high-risk obligations now point at December 2027 and August 2028 — and those dates are binding.
The Omnibus is in force
The Digital Omnibus on AI, the amendment that rewrote several AI Act deadlines, cleared its final political hurdles in June: the European Parliament endorsed it on June 16, 2026, and the Council gave final approval on June 29, 2026. On July 24, 2026 it was published in the Official Journal of the EU as Regulation (EU) 2026/1744, and it entered into force three days later, on July 27, 2026. The deferred dates are no longer agreed policy waiting on paperwork; they are the law.
What this means right now
If you are planning around the AI Act this month, the practical reading is simple. The deferred dates are certain, and the August 2, 2026 obligations are equally certain, because they were never part of the deferral at all.
What still happens on August 2, 2026
The Article 50 transparency obligations apply as originally scheduled. If your AI system interacts directly with people, generates synthetic audio, image, video, or text, or performs emotion recognition or biometric categorization, disclosure duties arrive on that date. The governance and registration framework provisions also take effect, along with the enforcement powers of the Commission and the AI Office. "The AI Act was delayed" is only half true. This is the half that was not.
What moved, and to when
The obligations for standalone high-risk systems under Annex III moved from August 2026 to December 2, 2027. That covers recruitment, credit scoring, education, essential services, and the other listed categories. High-risk AI embedded in regulated products under Annex I (medical devices, machinery, vehicles and similar) moved from August 2027 to August 2, 2028. National regulatory sandboxes moved to August 2, 2027.
Two December 2, 2026 items are easy to mix up. The machine-readable marking duty for generative systems already on the market before August 2, 2026 takes effect then, after a four-month grace period. Systems placed on the market later must comply from placement. The second item is a genuinely new prohibition, added by the Omnibus rather than delayed by it: a ban on AI systems for generating non-consensual intimate imagery and child sexual abuse material.
What to watch next
Two things, in order. First, any Commission guidance on the Article 50 disclosure formats as August 2 approaches — now six days away. Second, the first enforcement posture signals after the deadline passes. Our deadline checker maps these dates to your specific situation, and the full timeline shows every milestone with its original and current date.
This page is informational, not legal advice. Sources and verification method are on the methodology page.