The FCC Test Lab Rule Follows the Measurement
Every connected product whose FCC application is received on or after December 1, 2028 will need its test measurements taken in the United States or a Reciprocal Economy, and in 2025 the People's Republic of China is where the testing was done for 82% of all distinct equipment authorization applications the FCC received. On October 29, 2026 the FCC adopted FCC 26-73, a Report and Order in ET Docket No. 24-136, released October 30. It limits FCC recognition of test labs to those located in the United States and in Reciprocal Economies, for every application received on or after December 1, 2028. Products already certified keep their grants. The next certification is where the cost sits.
What the order adopts
The final rules amend 47 CFR Part 2. Read across them, the order does four things.
- Test labs located in a non-Reciprocal Economy are not recognized for applications received on or after December 1, 2028.
- Certification bodies and laboratory accreditation bodies carry the same restriction, made explicit. None sat outside those jurisdictions when the order was adopted, so for them the order principally codifies existing practice.
- No product class is exempt. The Commission rejected exceptions for low-risk, low-power and consumer devices and applied reciprocity to all RF device testing.
- No general waiver process exists for labs in non-Reciprocal Economies. The ordinary good-cause waiver under 47 CFR § 1.3 remains, and the Commission said it does not anticipate needing to grant one.
New § 2.902 defines a Reciprocal Economy as the territory of an economy with which the United States has a mutual recognition agreement "or comparable government-to-government reciprocity agreement with respect to equipment authorization, such as a Free Trade Agreement or Agreement on Reciprocal Trade." Every other territory is a non-Reciprocal Economy. The list in Appendix D names Taiwan, Japan, Korea, Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and the members of the European Union, among others. Mainland China is not on it. The Office of Engineering and Technology publishes and updates the list, may add economies, and must establish a way to remove one where reciprocal treatment is not being provided in practice.
A quarter of the labs, four-fifths of the testing
The order publishes its own count. The Commission recognizes 609 test labs.
- People's Republic of China, 25.1%, about 153 labs.
- Taiwan, 18.4%.
- United States, 17.9%.
- Japan, 9.4%.
- South Korea, 6.6%.
The share of applications those labs carry is a different picture. The PRC's share of testing for equipment authorization applications rose from roughly 13% in 2007 to 82% of all distinct applications received in 2025, drawn from the FCC's own equipment authorization records. By 2025 the United States had fallen below 4%, Taiwan to about 8% and South Korea to around 2%. In the order's words, "roughly five out of every six RF devices are tested in foreign economies with which the United States has no reciprocal agreement governing conformity assessment."
Put those two sets of numbers side by side. About 153 labs did the testing behind more than four-fifths of 2025's applications, and those are the labs that cannot support an application received from December 1, 2028. The other 456 or so handled under a fifth of the work, and those of them located in the United States and Reciprocal Economies are where all of it has to go. The order gives 25 months so that manufacturers have "time to qualify alternative laboratories and United States and Reciprocal Economy laboratories time to expand capacity," and the Commission says it "will track whether manufacturers are able to secure timely access to recognized Test Labs." That capacity is being asked of the part of the lab base that carried the smaller share of the load.
The rule follows the measurement
A lab's name and headquarters do not settle anything under this order. New § 2.902 defines a test lab's covered activity as "test setup and operation, required measurements, technical analysis of results, and preparation or approval of the test report relied on for certification." The order then bars a recognized lab from "maintaining a headquarters, place of organization, or recognized site in a Reciprocal Economy while conducting the testing ... in a non-Reciprocal Economy." New § 2.951(b)(4) and (d)(4) deny recognition, starting December 1, 2028, to a measurement facility that "is located in, or that conducts FCC-recognized covered activity from within, a non-Reciprocal Economy."
Read together, a report on a United States or Taiwanese lab's letterhead whose measurements were taken in Shenzhen does not satisfy the rule, and the lab that issued it puts its own recognition at risk. Pre-compliance and R&D testing in mainland China stays outside the rule as long as it is not represented as FCC-recognized testing and is not relied on in the application.
The date runs on receipt
The cutoff attaches to the application, not the grant. The prohibition is "applied prospectively to applications received on or after that date, and will not disturb equipment authorizations granted or applications received before that date." Equipment properly tested and authorized before December 1, 2028 "will remain fully certified and may continue to be imported, marketed, sold, operated, and modified" with no retesting required just because its lab lost recognition. Retesting can still be required for other deficiencies, fraudulent test information among them.
No lab loses recognition as a direct result of the order. Recognition runs two years, and between December 1, 2026 and December 1, 2028 the Office of Engineering and Technology keeps granting it to labs in non-Reciprocal Economies, but never past December 1, 2028. A lab recognized on January 1, 2028 gets 11 months. After that date, the Commission "will simply cease to renew recognition for these Test Labs."
What the order leaves open
The Commission did not adopt a broader prohibition on labs, certification bodies or accreditation bodies "owned by, controlled by, or subject to the jurisdiction or direction of a non-Reciprocal Economy." The Third Further Notice asks about that ownership bar, and asks whether equipment authorized through the Supplier's Declaration of Conformity process should be tested in labs based in the United States or Reciprocal Economies. Both are questions. Comments are due 30 and 60 days after Federal Register publication, and the order had not appeared in the Federal Register as of November 2, 2026.
Where it lands
For a company that buys, imports or brands connected equipment, the exposure is not the inventory on its shelf or the installed base, all of which keeps its grants. It sits in each vendor's next certification, a new model or a refresh under a new FCC ID, received on or after December 1, 2028. Whatever lab name or address the report carries, an application whose measurements were taken in mainland China, or anywhere else outside the United States and its Reciprocal Economies, has no recognized test behind it, and no product-class exemption or general waiver stands in for one. The vendor's answer on where its measurements are taken decides whether its next product reaches the United States on schedule.