---
type: Statutory Article
title: "Article 3 — Obligation to make product data and related service data accessible to the user"
description: "Data by design becomes a product requirement, like safety. The building's edge devices must be born legible to their owner."
resource: "https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2023/2854/oj/eng"
tags: ["eu-data-act", "chapter-ii", "access", "design"]
instrument: eu-data-act
article: 3
chapter: "II"
binds: ["manufacturer"]
applies_from: 2026-09-12
cross_refs: [4, 50]
attaches_to: ["air", "camera", "controller", "door", "meter", "occupancy"]
legal_review: none
generated: { by: claude-code/opus-5.5, at: "2026-10-09T00:00:00Z" }
status: draft
sources:
  - id: eli
    resource: "https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2023/2854/oj/eng"
    title: "Regulation (EU) 2023/2854, Official Journal"
  - id: prototype
    resource: "https://github.com/DavidJCrawford/stewardship-explorer/blob/main/src/data/act.json"
    title: "stewardship-explorer act.json (author's summaries, July 2026)"
---

# Precise reading

Connected products and related services must be designed and provided so that product and related-service data (including metadata) are, by default, easily, securely, free of charge, and where relevant and technically feasible directly accessible to the user, in a comprehensive, structured, commonly used, machine-readable format. Pre-contract transparency duties about the data apply. Bites for products/services placed on the market after 12 Sep 2026.[^eli]

*A faithful summary of the operative demand, not the statutory text.*

# Plain reading

Data by design becomes a product requirement, like safety. The building's edge devices must be born legible to their owner.

*Paraphrase.*

# Facts

| | |
| --- | --- |
| Chapter | II — [Business to Consumer and Business to Business Data Sharing](/law/eu-data-act/chapters.md) |
| Binds | [Manufacturer](/law/eu-data-act/actors.md) |
| Applies from | 2026-09-12 |
| Cross-references | [Article 4](/law/eu-data-act/articles/article-04.md), [Article 50](/law/eu-data-act/articles/article-50.md) |
| Where it attaches in the building | [air](/building/components/air.md), [camera](/building/components/camera.md), [controller](/building/components/controller.md), [door](/building/components/door.md), [meter](/building/components/meter.md), [occupancy](/building/components/occupancy.md) |

# Rights that rest on it

- [New devices must be born open.](/rights/born-open.md)

[^eli]: Regulation (EU) 2023/2854, Official Journal