Right to Repair Statistics 2026
By Axis Intelligence Research
Co-author: Alex Rivera · Consumer Technology | Last updated: September 14, 2026 | License: CC BY 4.0
Eight U.S. states now have a consumer-electronics repair statute in force, covering roughly 35.5% of Americans after Texas switched on September 1, 2026. Axis Intelligence Research scores those eight statutes at a mean of 61.0 on the Repair Rights Strength Index — and finds Colorado, not Oregon, holds the strongest law in the country.
Quick Answer
Right to repair moved from campaign to statute in 2026. Eight states — California, Colorado, Connecticut, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, Texas and Washington — have consumer-electronics repair laws in force as of September 14, 2026, and PIRG puts the share of Americans living under an enforceable repair law at 25.75% from January 1, 2026, rising to at least 35.5% once Connecticut and Texas took effect. Axis Intelligence Research estimates that coverage puts about $17.5 billion of annual household repair savings inside legal reach. On the same day, the EU’s repair directive became applicable across 27 member states.
Key Findings
- According to Axis Intelligence Research, eight U.S. states had a consumer-electronics repair statute in force on September 14, 2026: California, Colorado, Connecticut, Minnesota, New York, Oregon, Texas and Washington.
- Axis Intelligence Research scores Colorado’s HB24-1121 at 80 points on the Repair Rights Strength Index (RRSI), the highest score of any U.S. electronics repair statute, ahead of Oregon at 79 and Washington at 76.
- Axis Intelligence Research finds that only three of the eight statutes restrict parts pairing, and only two of those restrictions — Colorado’s and Washington’s — are enforceable today.
- U.S. PIRG Education Fund estimated that repairing rather than replacing electronics would save the average American household about $382 a year, or $49.6 billion nationally.
- The Global E-waste Monitor 2024 recorded 62 million tonnes of e-waste generated in 2022, of which 22.3% was documented as formally collected and recycled.
Source: axis-intelligence.com/right-to-repair-statistics/
Which U.S. States Have a Right to Repair Law in 2026?
Eight states have an electronics repair statute in force. The sequence matters more than the count: New York went first and narrowest, the West Coast went broadest, and 2026 was the year the map filled in.
PIRG counted six new repair laws coming into force at the start of 2026 — including consumer-electronics laws in Colorado and Washington plus wheelchair laws in Nevada, Oregon and Washington — taking population coverage to 25.75% on January 1. Texas then followed on September 1, which PIRG described as making Texas the ninth state to pass a consumer-electronics repair law.
| State | Statute | In force | Covered devices reach back to | Parts pairing restricted | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New York | Digital Fair Repair Act | Dec 28, 2023 | July 2023, consumer sales only | No | PIRG |
| California | SB 244 | Jul 1, 2024 | July 2021 (devices $50+) | No | California Legislature |
| Minnesota | Digital Fair Repair Act | Jul 1, 2024 | July 2021 | No | Minnesota Attorney General |
| Oregon | SB 1596 | Jan 1, 2025 | July 2015 (phones: July 2021) | Yes (devices made after Jan 1, 2025) | PIRG |
| Colorado | HB24-1121 | Jan 1, 2026 | July 1, 2021 | Yes (devices sold after Jan 1, 2026) | Colorado General Assembly |
| Washington | ESHB 1483 | Jan 1, 2026 | July 1, 2021 | Yes (devices sold after Jan 1, 2026) | Washington State Legislature |
| Connecticut | Senate Bill 3 (2025) | Jul 1, 2026 | July 1, 2026 (no reach-back) | No | PIRG |
| Texas | HB 2963 | Sep 1, 2026 | Not specified in enacted text | No | Texas Legislature |
Source: enacted statutory text and legislative bill reports, retrieved September 14, 2026. Full provenance in the dataset.
How Much of the U.S. Population Is Covered?
Coverage is the number that actually moves. A statute in a small state is a headline; a statute in Texas is a market. PIRG’s projection, published in December 2025, put coverage at 25.75% on January 1, 2026 and at least 35.5% once the Connecticut and Texas laws took effect.
That share is what converts an abstract consumer benefit into a quantity. Using PIRG Education Fund’s own savings estimate:
129 million U.S. households × 35.5% coverage × $382 = $17.5 billion
Axis Intelligence Research estimates that roughly $17.5 billion in annual household repair savings now sits inside the legal perimeter of U.S. repair statutes. The inputs are PIRG Education Fund’s household count of 129 million and per-household savings estimate of $382, multiplied by PIRG’s coverage share. It is an estimate, not an observation — it assumes coverage translates into behaviour, which is exactly the assumption the next three years will test.
Alex Rivera: Coverage math flatters the movement, and it should be read with the refresh cycle in mind. A repair right attaches to a device you already own, so its value depends on how long the installed base lives. The average household is not weighing “repair versus replace” on a spreadsheet — it is weighing a $329 screen against a carrier upgrade offer that feels free at signature. Statutes change the price of the first option. They do not change the marketing budget behind the second.
Which State Has the Strongest Right to Repair Law?
Colorado does. Axis Intelligence Research scores it at 80 points on the Repair Rights Strength Index (RRSI), one point ahead of Oregon.
This is a genuinely counterintuitive result, because Oregon has carried the “strongest in the nation” label since 2024 on the strength of being first to restrict parts pairing. Oregon still wins the pairing component outright and has by far the deepest reach-back — its coverage extends to devices sold since July 2015, with phones from July 2021. What costs Oregon the top spot is enforcement timing: the law took effect January 1, 2025 but is not enforced until 2027. Colorado’s text, by contrast, is live, enforceable, and covers a wider slice of the home.
The Repair Rights Strength Index (RRSI)
RRSI — Repair Rights Strength Index. An Axis Intelligence Research metric that scores an enacted consumer-electronics repair statute from 0 to 100 on five components, using only attributes stated in the statutory text or the legislature’s own bill report.
| Component | Weight | What it measures |
|---|---|---|
| Parts-pairing restriction | 25 | Whether software can still reject a functional third-party part |
| Retroactive reach | 20 | How far back the covered installed base extends |
| Scope breadth | 20 | Product categories covered against categories carved out |
| Guaranteed availability period | 20 | Minimum years parts, tools and documentation must stay available |
| Enforcement status | 15 | Whether the obligation is enforceable on the snapshot date |
| Rank | State | Pairing /25 | Reach /20 | Scope /20 | Duration /20 | Enforcement /15 | RRSI |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Colorado | 22 | 15 | 20 | 8 | 15 | 80 |
| 2 | Oregon | 25 | 20 | 17 | 8 | 9 | 79 |
| 3 | Washington | 22 | 15 | 16 | 8 | 15 | 76 |
| 4 | California | 0 | 15 | 13 | 20 | 15 | 63 |
| 5 | Minnesota | 0 | 15 | 18 | 8 | 15 | 56 |
| 6 | Texas | 0 | 5 | 9 | 20 | 15 | 49 |
| 7 | Connecticut | 0 | 5 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 47 |
| 8 | New York | 0 | 8 | 7 | 8 | 15 | 38 |
Snapshot date: September 14, 2026. Component scoring rules and inputs are in the Methodology section; every input is a row in the downloadable dataset.
National RRSI: 61.0 (unweighted mean of the eight scored statutes, 488 ÷ 8).
Three readings are worth pulling out of that table. Colorado’s 20/20 on scope is earned: the enrolled text defines digital electronic equipment as any hardware product depending on embedded digital electronics, and then carves out fourteen named categories rather than defining coverage narrowly from the start — appliances, HVAC controls, printers and IT hardware fall inside. New York’s 38 is the floor, and it is a policy fact, not a drafting accident: the law was narrowed on signature to consumer transactions only, excluding business-to-business and government-contract sales, and applies only to devices sold after July 2023. And the price-tier states — California and Texas — buy their points in a different currency: neither touches pairing, but both guarantee a minimum availability period, three years for devices between $50 and $100 and seven years above $100.
Why Parts Pairing Is the Component That Decides the Decade
A parts mandate without a pairing rule is a mandate to sell you a component your device can refuse.
Only three of the eight statutes address it. Colorado’s enrolled text prohibits manufacturers from using parts pairing to prevent installation of an otherwise functional replacement part, to reduce functionality or performance, or to display misleading alerts about unidentified parts that the owner cannot immediately dismiss. It leaves two doors open: repair-logging, and standalone biometric components used for authentication, provided those components are not bundled into commonly replaced parts such as a screen, keyboard, ports or battery. Washington’s bill report describes the same structure, including the standalone-biometric carve-out.
Axis Intelligence Research finds that two of the three pairing restrictions are enforceable today. Oregon’s is the strictest on paper and the slowest on the clock.
The federal posture has been consistent for five years and has not been codified. The FTC’s 2021 report to Congress, Nixing the Fix, concluded that there is scant evidence to support manufacturers’ justifications for repair restrictions, and the Commission has since told state legislators directly that it debunked the safety and cybersecurity arguments manufacturers raise against pairing rules. That finding is now cited in state committee rooms more often than in federal ones.
Alex Rivera: Firmware is rarely region-locked. That is the quiet reason state pairing rules matter more than their population share suggests — a manufacturer that has to accept an unpaired battery on a device sold in Denver is unlikely to maintain a separate Denver build. The upgrade-worthiness question for a buyer changes accordingly: a phone bought in 2026 is the first cohort whose out-of-warranty repair path is defended by statute in three states and, in practice, wherever that firmware ships.
What Does the EU Right to Repair Directive Require in 2026?
Two European instruments now bind manufacturers, and they work on different timelines.
Directive (EU) 2024/1799 had to be transposed into national law by 31 July 2026, and the rules apply from that date. Where repair is chosen as the remedy, the directive amends the sale-of-goods rules so the guarantee period is extended once by one year, and sellers must tell consumers about the choice between repair and replacement before providing a remedy. The European repair platform becomes fully operational by 1 January 2028.
The case the Commission built for it is quantified. Premature disposal of repairable items is associated with 35 million tonnes of waste and 261 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions in the EU each year, and replacing rather than repairing is estimated to cost consumers almost €12 billion per year.
Separately, and already biting, the smartphone rules. From 20 June 2025, ecodesign and energy-labelling requirements apply to smartphones, cordless phones and tablets placed on the EU market: batteries capable of at least 800 charge cycles while retaining 80% of initial capacity, critical spare parts supplied within 5–10 working days and for at least seven years after the model stops being sold, and operating-system upgrades available for at least five years. The Commission projects €20 billion in consumer savings and 2.2 TWh of electricity savings in 2030. The label carries a repairability class alongside the energy grade.
France ran the experiment first, and its consumer numbers are the ones worth watching. ADEME reports that 69% of French adults repaired an object in the previous two years, and counts more than 6,500 labelled repair locations in 2025 under the repair-bonus scheme.
Alex Rivera: Europe legislated the spare-part price and the delivery window; the U.S. legislated access on “fair and reasonable terms.” Those are not the same instrument. A seven-year parts obligation with a ten-working-day ceiling is a supply-chain requirement with a date attached. “Fair and reasonable” is a standard that gets defined later, by an attorney general or a court, on a timetable nobody controls.
How Much Does Repair Actually Save Households?
The best available national estimate is four years old, and it is still the number everyone cites — which is itself a finding about this market.
U.S. PIRG Education Fund’s Repair Saves Families Big II estimated that American households spend about $1,767 a year buying new electronics, that repair could cut household spending on electronics and appliances by 21.6%, and that this equals roughly $382 per household or $49.6 billion across 129 million households. [older data] — the spending base is 2021 and no comparable national update has been published since; we flag it rather than refresh it silently.
| Measure | Value | As of | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Annual household electronics spending | $1,767 | 2021 data | U.S. PIRG Education Fund |
| Potential reduction from repair | 21.6% | 2023 report | U.S. PIRG Education Fund |
| Annual savings per household | $382 | 2023 report | U.S. PIRG Education Fund |
| National annual savings | $49.6B | 2023 report | U.S. PIRG Education Fund |
| Savings inside current legal coverage | $17.5B (est.) | Sep 14, 2026 | Axis Intelligence Research |
The resale market is the other half of this picture, and it behaves differently from the repair market — see our refurbished electronics statistics for the secondary-market volumes that repair access feeds, and the refurbished smartphone market share breakdown for how that demand splits by brand.
What Is the E-Waste Case for Repair?
The Global E-waste Monitor 2024, from UNITAR and ITU, recorded 62 million tonnes of e-waste generated in 2022 — rising five times faster than documented recycling — with 22.3% formally collected and recycled and $91 billion worth of metals embedded in that year’s stream. Generation is on track to reach 82 million tonnes by 2030.
State-level figures land harder. PIRG and Environment Texas put Texas e-waste at 621,000 tons a year in the coverage of the state’s new law.
What Is Coming Next in Right to Repair Legislation?
Three fronts are open, and one of them is new.
Repair scores. On June 4, 2026 the New York Senate passed legislation requiring the state to adopt a repair scoring system and retailers to post the scores at the point of sale; the Assembly had already passed it, leaving it awaiting the governor’s signature. That would be the first repairability label in the United States, and it imports a mechanism Europe has already run — France has required repair scores since 2021.
Volume. The Repair Association counted more than 33 right-to-repair bills filed across 13 states in the first weeks of January 2026, covering electronics, farm equipment, wheelchairs and vehicles, as reported by Waste Dive.
Category expansion. The 2026 wave is no longer only about phones. Wheelchair statutes took effect in Nevada, Oregon and Washington on January 1, 2026, and federal attention has moved toward military equipment procurement.
Alex Rivera: Watch the label fight, not the parts fight. A parts mandate changes what happens after a device breaks, which is a small population in any given year. A repair score changes what happens at the shelf, to every buyer, before anything breaks. Manufacturers understand the difference in exposure, which is why the scoring bills are drawing the harder lobbying.
Methodology
Collection. Every figure in this article was retrieved on September 14, 2026 from the source named in its row of the dataset. Statutory attributes were taken from enacted text where available — Colorado’s enrolled HB24-1121 and Washington’s engrossed substitute bill report were read in full — and from the sponsoring legislature or the campaign organisation that authored the underlying research otherwise. No figure in this article is drawn from a compilation, an aggregator or a competing statistics page.
RRSI construction. The index scores eight statutes across five components totalling 100 points. Scoring rules:
- Parts-pairing restriction (25): 25 where a prohibition is in force or scheduled with the earliest trigger date; 22 where a prohibition exists with a later trigger date and named carve-outs; 0 where the statute is silent.
- Retroactive reach (20): 20 for coverage reaching devices sold in 2015; 15 for 2021; 8 for 2023; 5 where the statute applies only forward from its effective date, or where the enacted text reviewed does not establish a reach-back.
- Scope breadth (20): scored on covered product categories against named exclusions, from 20 (digital electronic equipment defined broadly, including appliances, HVAC and IT hardware) down to 7 (personal electronics in consumer transactions only).
- Guaranteed availability period (20): 20 for an explicit tiered minimum reaching seven years; 14 for a tiered minimum reaching five years; 8 where the statute imposes parity with authorised providers but no minimum term.
- Enforcement status (15): 15 where the obligation is enforceable on the snapshot date; 9 where the statute is effective but enforcement is deferred.
A competent outsider can recompute every score from the statutory attributes in the dataset. Weights are fixed across states; no state-specific adjustment is applied. Where a statutory attribute was not established by the enacted text we reviewed, the lower score is applied and the row is labelled accordingly rather than estimated.
Savings calculation. The $17.5 billion figure is 129,000,000 households × 0.355 × $382. Household count and per-household savings are U.S. PIRG Education Fund’s; the coverage share is PIRG’s projection for the post-Texas period. The two inputs share a publisher and a methodology family, which is why we combine them; we do not blend them with survey-based repair-rate figures, which measure a different thing.
Snapshot dating. Coverage, index readings and statute status carry the date September 14, 2026. Legal status changes; the reading does not follow it automatically.
About This Dataset
right-to-repair-statistics.csv contains 62 observations: statutory attributes for the eight U.S. electronics repair statutes, RRSI component and total scores, U.S. coverage and savings figures, EU directive and ecodesign requirements, French repair-scheme indicators, and global e-waste measures. Every row carries source organisation, source document, URL, retrieval date, a primary-source flag, and a flag marking Axis-calculated values with a pointer to the formula.
Licence: CC BY 4.0. Reuse freely with attribution.
Cite this dataset: Axis Intelligence Research, Right to Repair Statistics 2026, 2026.
Cite This Page
APA — Axis Intelligence Research. (2026). Right to repair statistics 2026: Laws, coverage, costs and the 8 U.S. states ranked. Axis Intelligence. https://axis-intelligence.com/right-to-repair-statistics/
MLA — Axis Intelligence Research. “Right to Repair Statistics 2026: Laws, Coverage, Costs and the 8 U.S. States Ranked.” Axis Intelligence, 14 Sept. 2026, axis-intelligence.com/right-to-repair-statistics/.
Chicago — Axis Intelligence Research. “Right to Repair Statistics 2026: Laws, Coverage, Costs and the 8 U.S. States Ranked.” Axis Intelligence. September 14, 2026. https://axis-intelligence.com/right-to-repair-statistics/.
Frequently Asked Questions
If my phone was bought before my state’s law took effect, does the law still cover it?
It depends on the reach-back date written into the statute, not on when the law switched on. Colorado’s enrolled text covers hardware first manufactured and first sold or used in Colorado on or after July 1, 2021. Washington uses the same July 1, 2021 date. Oregon reaches furthest — devices other than phones sold since July 2015, phones since July 2021. Connecticut runs forward only, applying to products first manufactured, sold or used in the state on or after July 1, 2026.
Can a manufacturer still use software to reject a third-party battery or screen?
In five of the eight states, yes — the statute does not address it. Colorado, Oregon and Washington restrict parts pairing, and Colorado’s text specifically prohibits using it to block a functional replacement part, degrade performance, or throw undismissable warnings about unidentified parts. Colorado and Washington also preserve pairing for standalone biometric components used for authentication, as long as those are not bundled into a screen, keyboard, ports or battery.
Does my state’s repair law cover my washing machine, or only my laptop?
Scope is the widest variation between states. Colorado’s definition reaches appliances, HVAC equipment, printers and IT hardware while excluding fourteen named categories including video game consoles, medical devices, motor vehicles, marine and aviation equipment, and fire-alarm and access-control systems. Connecticut covers electronics and appliances but exempts consoles and alarm systems. Texas targets phones, laptops and tablets and excludes home appliances. New York is the narrowest, covering personal electronics sold in consumer transactions.
How long is a manufacturer required to keep parts available?
Only some statutes set a clock. California and Texas both use price tiers: three years for devices between $50 and $100, seven years above $100. Connecticut uses three or five years depending on price. Colorado, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota and New York instead require parity — whatever the manufacturer gives its own authorised repair network must be available to owners and independent shops — without a stated minimum term. In the EU, critical spare parts for smartphones and tablets must remain available for at least seven years after the model stops being sold.
Who enforces these laws if a manufacturer refuses to supply a part?
State enforcement runs through consumer-protection statutes rather than a repair-specific regulator, which is why Colorado’s provisions sit inside the Colorado Consumer Protection Act. Timing matters as much as authority: Oregon’s law has been effective since January 1, 2025, but enforcement does not begin until 2027.
Does using an independent repair shop void my warranty?
Federal warranty law, not state repair law, governs that question — the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act limits a warrantor’s ability to condition coverage on the use of a specific service provider. The FTC has treated this as an enforcement priority since its 2021 Nixing the Fix report, which found scant evidence for manufacturers’ justifications for repair restrictions.
Will the EU directive change what I can demand from a manufacturer outside the guarantee period?
That is its stated purpose. Directive (EU) 2024/1799 had to be transposed and applied from 31 July 2026, and it requires manufacturers to repair covered products and obliges sellers to inform consumers of the choice between repair and replacement. Choosing repair as the remedy extends the guarantee period once, by one year. The European repair platform that will list repairers becomes fully operational by 1 January 2028.
Is a repairability score coming to U.S. shelves?
New York is closest. Its legislature passed a repair-score bill on June 4, 2026, requiring a state scoring system with scores posted at the point of sale, and the bill awaits the governor’s signature. France has required repair scores since 2021, and the EU energy label for smartphones and tablets has carried a repairability class since June 20, 2025.