EU KIDS Act (proposed Regulation, COM(2026) 681 final)

What it requires

The proposal sets obligations for the protection of minors online, a minor being any person under 18. Article 2 applies it to providers of seven categories of service or system: online social networking services, video-sharing platform services, software application stores, online games, operating systems, AI companions and general conversational chatbots. Article 9 addresses addictive design and is directed at providers of online social networking services and of video-sharing platform services; it treats as encouraging compulsive use the enabling of automatic play and of uninterrupted content consumption without effective and regular interruption moments, notifications not triggered by the minor's own activity, and incentives to engage at regular times or with greater frequency including through penalties or loss of benefits. Article 13, addressed to the same two categories, requires that a minor be made aware in real time that a transaction is an economic transaction, requires purchases made with virtual currency purchasable with funds to display the corresponding value in the official currency of the minor's Member State, and bars designs that can lead to excessive, impulsive or unwanted spending, expressly including exposing minors to variable reward systems. Article 16 places separate obligations on providers of software application stores. The text sets an annual supervisory fee capped at 0.03% of a provider's worldwide annual net income. It would enter into force 20 days after publication in the Official Journal and apply six months later, with the commencement dates left as placeholders in the tabled text. A Communication adopted the same day, COM(2026) 680 final, sets out the wider EU approach to online child safety.

Why it bears on this field

The virtual-currency and addictive-design provisions describe the mechanics of coin-funded vertical drama: episode paywalls bought with purchased currency, autoplay into the next episode, and reward mechanics. On the tabled text those provisions reach providers of online social networking services and of video-sharing platform services, which are defined by reference to Regulation (EU) 2022/1925. A standalone subscription or coin-funded video application is not among the seven categories Article 2 lists. The practical line the text draws is therefore between a vertical drama distributed on a video-sharing platform, which is reached, and the same drama inside its publisher's own application, which is not, while Article 16 reaches the app stores through which both are distributed. Reporting that describes the proposal as carrying a general penalty of 6% of worldwide turnover does not match the text: that ceiling appears by cross-reference to Article 99 of Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 and is addressed to providers of AI companions and general conversational chatbots.

Open questions

• Will Article 2 be amended during the ordinary legislative procedure to add video-on-demand or other standalone media applications, which would reverse the scope position described here?
• How will the definitions imported from Regulation (EU) 2022/1925 be applied to applications that carry only publisher-supplied content and no user uploads?
• What penalty ceiling will apply to providers other than AI companions and general conversational chatbots?
• What dates will replace the bracketed commencement placeholders in the tabled text?

Timeline

• 2026-09-17The Commission adopts COM(2026) 681 final, a proposal for a Regulation titled the EU KIDS Act, together with COM(2026) 680 final, a Communication on an EU approach to online child safety. Procedure 2026/0286(COD). Source (opens in a new tab)