Study for the European Commission expects modest age-check costs for most online services

Making websites and apps check users' ages would add new costs, but most services would pay modest sums, according to a study the European Commission published on November 4, 2026. Its author, Owen Bennett, expects setup to run to hundreds of euros or the low thousands for services that buy a ready-made tool, and he cites a UK regulator's estimate of a median of about €0.07 per check. An in-house system is another matter: he puts that in the hundreds of thousands of euros.

The timing matters. The Commission adopted its proposed EU KIDS Act on September 17 and is taking feedback until December 3. The proposal would bar social media accounts for under-13s, allow supervised accounts at 13 and 14, and replace typed-in birth dates with certified age verification. The Commission says it procured the study to support that work but that the study does not assess the proposal. The report's legal notice says the views are the author's and that the Commission does not guarantee the data.

The numbers, and how firm they are

The report itself says a lack of rigorous data limits what can be estimated. It leans on experience in the UK and Australia and on figures vendors report about themselves. Most of its numbers are other bodies' estimates, which the study gives mainly in euros.

At the UK median, a million checks would come to about €70,000, by our arithmetic, though the study says the price per check falls as volume rises. The study says that is likely to benefit large platforms. It expects smaller firms using third-party tools to pay proportionally more per check and to carry higher compliance costs for their size, but says low-cost tools, vendor competition and one EU rule in place of a patchwork of national ones should largely shield them from excessive costs.

The catch in the EU's own tool

The study looks to the EU Age Verification blueprint to hold costs down: a publicly funded, open-source design that it says could be among the cheapest options for services of every size. The Commission's summary calls for a faster roll-out. It does not mention a further caveat in the report: it is not yet clear whether member states or other operators will try to recoup their costs, and the price of checks under the blueprint is still unsettled, though the author expects it to be low.

Availability is the other gap. Apps based on the blueprint exist in only a small number of member states, the report says, and most lack support such as properly resourced manual enrollment. It wants that fixed before any law takes effect. The Commission's technical portal lists France, Denmark, Greece, Italy, Spain, Cyprus and Ireland as piloting the tool during 2026.

The rights questions

On rights, the report's answer is conditional. Age cannot be checked without collecting some personal data, it notes, and it lists risks from over-collection, breaches and commercial profiling. Tools based on digital identity can shut out people without qualifying documents or NFC phones, facial age estimation carries a risk of algorithmic bias, and some adults may be put off or locked out. The author argues these problems can be substantially reduced through strict enforcement of the GDPR, privacy-preserving designs and a choice of methods. Of privacy-preserving checks at scale, he adds:

That outcome can by no means be assumed.

What comes next

The Commission's consultation is open until midnight Brussels time on December 3, 2026. The proposal would make platforms reaching at least 45 million monthly users in the EU submit compliance plans checked by auditors, with penalties of up to 6% of a company's global annual turnover, and it would lean on the Digital Services Act for enforcement against online platforms. It is still only a proposal for a regulation.