Article 56: codes of practice for general-purpose AI models

Paragraph 4 provides that the AI Office and the Board shall aim to ensure that the codes of practice clearly set out their specific objectives and contain commitments or measures, including key performance indicators as appropriate, to ensure the achievement of those objectives, and that they take due account of the needs and interests of all interested parties, including affected persons, at Union level. Paragraph 5 provides that the AI Office shall aim to ensure that participants to the codes of practice report regularly to the AI Office on the implementation of the commitments and the measures taken and their outcomes, including as measured against the key performance indicators as appropriate. Key performance indicators and reporting commitments shall reflect differences in size and capacity between various participants. Paragraph 6, as replaced by Article 1, point (21), of Regulation (EU) 2026/1744, provides that the Commission and the Board shall regularly monitor and evaluate the achievement of the objectives of the codes of practice by the participants and their contribution to the proper application of this Regulation. The Commission, taking utmost account of the opinion of the Board, shall assess whether the codes of practice cover the obligations provided for in Articles 53 and 55, and shall regularly monitor and evaluate the achievement of their objectives. The Commission shall publish its assessment of the adequacy of the codes of practice. The power to approve a code of practice by implementing act and give it general validity within the Union, which sat in the second subparagraph of paragraph 6 until 27 July 2026, lapsed with that replacement. Paragraph 7 provides that the AI Office may invite all providers of general-purpose AI models to adhere to the codes of practice. For providers of general-purpose AI models not presenting systemic risks this adherence may be limited to the obligations provided for in Article 53, unless they declare explicitly their interest to join the full code.

Paragraph 8 provides that the AI Office shall, as appropriate, also encourage and facilitate the review and adaptation of the codes of practice, in particular in light of emerging standards. The AI Office shall assist in the assessment of available standards. Paragraph 9 provides that codes of practice shall be ready at the latest by 2 May 2025. The AI Office shall take the necessary steps, including inviting providers pursuant to paragraph 7. The second subparagraph of paragraph 9 provides that if, by 2 August 2025, a code of practice cannot be finalised, or if the AI Office deems it is not adequate following its assessment under paragraph 6 of this Article, the Commission may provide, by means of implementing acts, common rules for the implementation of the obligations provided for in Articles 53 and 55, including the issues set out in paragraph 2 of this Article. Those implementing acts shall be adopted in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 98(2).

A code of practice is a voluntary instrument, and that word does all the work here. Signing creates no new obligation: your obligations remain those of Articles 53 and 55, and Article 56 changes nothing about them. Not signing is not an infringement either, because paragraphs 3 and 7 speak of inviting and not of requiring. What does shift is the burden of proof. A provider adhering to a code can point to a shared elaboration, assessed by the AI Office and the Board, when a regulator asks how it keeps its documentation up to date, how detailed its summary about the training content is, or how it assesses and manages systemic risk. A provider that does not sign has to write that elaboration itself and defend it itself, up to and including the question why its own approach is at least as good. That is not a legal difference in the norm, but it is a large difference in what is on the table when something is asked. Two things that are often conflated here. First: paragraph 7 allows a provider without a systemic-risk model to limit itself to the obligations in Article 53, unless it explicitly declares its interest in the full code. Partial participation is therefore an expressly foreseen choice and not half-heartedness. Second: paragraph 9 puts a stick behind the door that does not rest on you but does reach you. If no code comes about, or if the AI Office deems it inadequate, the Commission may lay down common rules by implementing acts for the implementation of Articles 53 and 55. Those rules, unlike a code, are not voluntary.

Precision is in order about the state of play, because this is where the market overstates the most. It is established that the General-Purpose AI Code of Practice was published on 10 July 2025; that code is archived in this repository as three chapter PDF files, on transparency, copyright and safety and security, and it is present as a source record in this knowledge base. Whether an approving implementing act followed was not established for the period up to 27 July 2026, and after that date it is no longer the right question: paragraph 6 no longer carries that power. Since then the question is whether the Commission has published its assessment of adequacy. That too is not established here, and for as long as that is the case you must not read anywhere that the code has been approved or has general validity within the Union. That distinction is not a formality: a published code is a text you can voluntarily adhere to, a code approved by implementing act is on top of that an instrument with general validity in the Union. Anyone mistaking the first for the second overestimates what a signature buys and underestimates what they still have to record themselves. The content of the three chapters was also not read in this build, so nothing in this object says anything about what exactly is in them. In practice that means the following. Check the approval status yourself and by date before you rely on the code in a conversation with a regulator or a customer, and record which version of the code and which chapter your adherence relates to. A code may be reviewed and adapted under paragraph 8, in particular in light of emerging standards, so a reliance on the code without a version reference ages on its own.