The second stage of the EU Ecodesign Regulation for electronic displays came into force this year. This is accompanied by new, stricter minimum requirements for the energy efficiency of displays. OLEDs and MicroLEDs are now also covered by the regulation – however, exceptions still apply to professional digital signage screens.
On March 1, 2023, the second stage of the EU Ecodesign Regulation for electronic displays came into force. It included new, stricter minimum requirements for the energy efficiency of displays. OLED and MicroLED are now also covered by the regulation.
The evaluation standard is the so-called energy efficiency index, which considers display size and luminance, as in the brightness of the screen, in a complicated formula. 8K displays and MicroLED cannot comply with these new limits. All display vendors now ship their TVs with power-saving presets to stay within the regulation. This also means that HDR, which is particularly energy-hungry, is deactivated.
The energy regulation cannot guarantee that the consumer maintains these settings or switches them off. Displays primarily intended for the B2B sector – such as professional digital signage displays – are exempt from the stricter specifications. Nonetheless, the industry has reason to worry. After all, more than 90 percent of all displays are sold as consumer TVs. Professional solutions are mostly just a further development of TV & Co.