The European repository is open

On 12 October 2026 the European Commission launched a pilot of the European repository for online political advertisements. It is the public database the Regulation asked for, and the place where online political advertisements in the EU and their transparency notices will be kept. Here is what it is, who has to use it and from when, and what PolAds does about it.

What the repository is

Reg. 2024/900 Art. 13(1)
The Commission shall establish and ensure, directly or by entrusting this responsibility to a management authority, the management of a European repository for online political advertisements (the ‘European repository’) which is a public repository for all online political advertisements published in the Union or directed to Union citizens or residents in the Union.

It has two parts. A public portal gives access to each online political advertisement and the information from its transparency notice, from the moment of first publication, in a machine-readable format that can be searched on several criteria at once (Article 13(1), point (a)). A hosting service keeps the advertisement and its information available while it runs and for seven years after it was last presented, free of charge for the publishers that submit to it (point (b)).

The point is scrutiny. The repository is meant to help individuals, researchers among them, look into who sponsors political advertising and how the landscape looks, in support of free and fair elections (Recital 64). The Commission has no liability for the completeness and accuracy of what is submitted (Article 13(5)). That stays with publishers and sponsors, who also keep it up to date (Recital 64).

What goes into it

Article 13(6) asked the Commission for the technical rules, and it adopted them on 9 April 2026 as Implementing Regulation (EU) 2026/818. For each online political advertisement, the repository takes (Annex, Section I, point 3):

• information that identifies the advertisement, such as its text, the link to its media files or an identifier the publisher gives it (Recital 3 lists these as examples)
• its permanent URL, where there is one
• the language of the information
• every element of the transparency notice, as set out in point 3 of Impl. Reg. 2025/1410, Annex II

In other words, the repository holds the same transparency notice you already publish, together with what identifies the advertisement it belongs to.

To submit, an organisation signs in with EU Login, the Commission's authentication service, and goes through an onboarding in which the Commission identifies and authorises it. Only onboarded users can submit, and each can ask for credentials for the repository's API (Section II). The API takes formats such as XML, JSON or JSON-LD (Section III, point 1). Every submission gets its own identifier, and a change is sent as a correction with the same base identifier and the next version tag (Section III, point 6). The repository's portal also offers a dashboard for uploading by hand, and publishes the XML schema a notice has to follow.

Who has to submit, and from when

Reg. 2024/900 Art. 13(4)
Political advertising publishers other than those referred to in paragraph 2 of this Article that publish political advertisements through an online service shall make each such political advertisement and the information required under Article 12(1) available in the European repository no later than 72 hours after the first publication of the political advertisement.

So the duty is the publisher's, and it covers advertisements published through an online service. Very large online platforms and search engines follow Article 13(2) instead: they keep the information in the advertisement repository the Digital Services Act already requires of them, and give access to it through the European repository.

None of this applies yet. The Commission's Guidelines say the obligations relating to the repository only become relevant from the date of its deployment (section 3.3.2). The pilot that opened on 12 October 2026 is for voluntary use, and the Commission will announce the official deployment date on the repository's portal well in advance. Implementing Regulation 2026/818 asks for the same: the date should be announced sufficiently in advance for publishers to prepare (Recital 5).

The transparency notice changes on that date too. Point 11 of the notice template links to the repository, for notices of online advertisements published from the date the repository is established, and on a notice provided online the link is described as ‘Link to the European Repository for online political advertisements’ (Impl. Reg. 2025/1410, Annex II, point 11 and its footnote).

PolAds helped shape it

To support the Regulation's implementation, the Commission set up an informal expert group of providers of political advertising services (Implementing Regulation 2026/818, Recital 6). PolAds took part in that group, and with it helped the Commission develop, shape and test the repository before the pilot opened.

How PolAds will help

• We will submit for you. Once the repository is officially deployed, PolAds will submit the transparency notices of the online advertisements you sign off on PolAds to the repository for you. You will not have to type a notice in twice. Before the deployment date, we will tell you whether there is anything to set up with the Commission on your side.
• Your notices are already in the right shape. On PolAds the advertiser files every element of the transparency notice as structured data, and you check and authorise it in Review & Authorise. Those are the elements the repository asks for. What you authorise on PolAds is what goes to the repository, which is why sign-off matters: the accuracy stays your responsibility, not the Commission's.
• Amendments become corrections. On PolAds a notice keeps its PA-ID for life, and an amendment is recorded on top of it without overwriting what it said before. The repository works the same way, with a correction under the same base identifier and the next version tag, so an amendment you confirm will reach the repository as a correction.
• The link on every notice. Until the official deployment, point 11 of a PolAds notice says there is no repository link yet. From the deployment date, we add the link to the notices of online advertisements, in the wording Annex II sets.
• Machine-readable today. Every public notice on PolAds can already be read by software, as JSON, XML or Markdown, which is what Article 12(3) asks of a notice made available electronically.

Nothing changes in how you work on PolAds today. Keep signing off your notices as you do now, and we will take care of the repository once it is ready. See what a publisher has to do for the rest of your duties, and pricing for the plans.

Sources

• European Commission news, 12 October 2026
• European repository for online political advertisements, portal
• Reg. (EU) 2024/900, Article 12(3)
• Reg. (EU) 2024/900, Article 13(1)
• Reg. (EU) 2024/900, Article 13(2)
• Reg. (EU) 2024/900, Article 13(4)
• Reg. (EU) 2024/900, Article 13(5)
• Reg. (EU) 2024/900, Article 13(6)
• Reg. (EU) 2024/900, Recital 64
• Impl. Reg. (EU) 2025/1410, Annex II
• Impl. Reg. (EU) 2026/818, Recitals 3, 5 and 6 and the Annex
• Commission Guidelines C/2025/5514, section 3.3.2