Regulations & Standards
Regulations and Standards for Global Product Compliance, Explained
Plain-language explanations of the regulatory frameworks and standards families behind product approvals: what they cover, who they apply to, how they relate, and how they're enforced across markets.
The frameworks
Regulations say what's required. Standards say how to show it. Knowing which is which is half the work.
Product compliance rests on two kinds of document. Regulations, directives, and technical regulations are law: they define what a product must achieve, who's responsible, and what happens if it doesn't. Standards are technical specifications, typically published by bodies like IEC, ISO, CISPR, EN, and national standards organizations, that describe how to test and construct a product so it meets the regulation. Regulations reference standards, sometimes making them mandatory and sometimes offering them as a presumption of conformity. A compliance team has to understand both layers and how they connect in each market.
This section of the library explains the major frameworks in plain language: what they cover, which products and companies they apply to, how they're structured, what evidence they expect, and how they're enforced. It's written for the compliance manager who needs to understand a framework quickly and the engineer who needs to know what a standard actually asks of a design. Each explanation is dated and links to the primary sources.
Framework families
The regulatory families we cover
Radio and telecommunications
FCC rules, ISED standards, the EU Radio Equipment Directive, and national type approval frameworks, with the ETSI, ANSI, and national standards they reference.
Electrical and product safety
The EU Low Voltage Directive and General Product Safety Regulation, North American NRTL systems, national safety schemes, and the IEC 60335, 62368, 60601, 61010 standards families.
EMC and energy
The EMC Directive, FCC Part 15, national EMC rules, CISPR and IEC 61000 standards, and the Ecodesign, Energy Labelling, DOE, and national efficiency frameworks.
Chemical and environmental
REACH, CLP, RoHS, POPs, TSCA, and national chemical regimes, plus WEEE, Battery, and Packaging Regulations and producer responsibility frameworks worldwide.
Sector frameworks
Medical device regulation, machinery and functional safety, vehicle type approval under UNECE, toy safety, cosmetics regulation, and other sector-specific regimes.
Emerging frameworks
Cybersecurity regulation for connected products, QR-code certificate mandates, AI regulation touching products, and the frameworks still taking shape.
How to use these explanations
Orientation first. Then the specifics, which are always about your product.
A framework explanation tells you what a regulation is for and how it works. It won't tell you whether your product's enclosure falls under a particular clause, whether an exemption applies to your use case, or how a specific market's authority is currently interpreting a requirement. Those questions are product-specific and market-specific, and they're where compliance decisions are actually made. Use the explanations to get oriented and to ask better questions. Then get the specifics from someone accountable for the answer.
The same applies to summaries from any source, including public AI. A confident explanation of a regulation can still be wrong about a validity period, an exemption, or a country's enforcement practice. Our explanations are read against the source by qualified professionals and dated. They're a reliable start. The finish is a regulatory analysis of your product.
Questions
Regulations and standards
Is compliance with the standard the same as compliance with the regulation?
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Not always. Meeting a harmonized or referenced standard usually gives a presumption of conformity with the regulation's requirements it covers, but the regulation may have requirements the standard doesn't address, and the standard may not be mandatory. Some markets make specific standards compulsory. Understanding the relationship in each market is essential.
What happens when a standard gets a new edition?
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Typically a transition period during which either edition is accepted, after which certificates to the old edition may no longer be issued or, in some schemes, may need to be updated. The dates differ by market and scheme. Standard revisions are a common trigger for regulatory alerts.
How do international standards relate to national ones?
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Most national standards for product safety and EMC are adoptions of IEC or ISO standards with national deviations. The deviations matter: they're why a test report needs to include them for each target market. Some markets maintain distinct national standards for specific products.
Need to know which of these apply to your product?
A pre-compliance assessment reads your product against every framework in every target market. Book a discussion and bring the product.
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