European Union — REACH Annex XVII, entry 27

The EU nickel restriction states a release rate, not a nickel content figure

Read as it stands in the consolidated text of 11 May 2026, entry 27 puts no figure on how much nickel is in an article. Its numbers are rates of nickel release from a surface over a week, and each number belongs to one provision only.

August 20, 2026

The quantity in entry 27 is a rate across a surface

Entry 27 of Annex XVII to Regulation (EC) No 1907/2006 (REACH) is the European Union's nickel restriction. In the consolidated text of 11 May 2026 (CELEX 02006R1907-20260511), read on 20 August 2026, every figure the entry states in Column 2 is written in the same unit: μg/cm²/week — micrograms of nickel released per square centimetre of surface, per week.

That unit decides what the numbers are about. A rate of release across an area over time is a different quantity from a share of mass. Neither figure in entry 27 is a percentage of nickel in an alloy, a purity statement, or a ceiling on how much nickel an article contains. The source itself names the first of the two figures, in its own parentheses, a “migration limit”.

The Annex around the entry is a table, headed “RESTRICTIONS ON THE MANUFACTURE, PLACING ON THE MARKET AND USE OF CERTAIN DANGEROUS SUBSTANCES, MIXTURES AND ARTICLES”. Column 1 carries the “Designation of the substance, of the group of substances or of the mixture”; Column 2 carries the “Conditions of restriction”. The nickel figures live in Column 2, inside numbered paragraphs, and each figure is written into one paragraph.

Two conventions from the source are kept here rather than tidied: the decimal comma in 0,2 and 0,5 is the source's own, and the micro sign and the square centimetre are reproduced as the source writes them.

Three provisions, and what each one attaches its number to

Quoted from the consolidated text of 11 May 2026, with the paragraph each line belongs to named.

Paragraph 1(a) — post assemblies inserted into pierced parts of the body, less than 0,2 μg/cm²/week: “1. Shall not be used: (a) in any post assemblies which are inserted into pierced ears and other pierced parts of the human body unless the rate of nickel release from such post assemblies is less than 0,2 μg/cm²/week (migration limit);”
Paragraph 1(b) — articles intended for direct and prolonged contact with the skin, greater than 0,5 μg/cm²/week: “(b) in articles intended to come into direct and prolonged contact with the skin such as: — earrings, — necklaces, bracelets and chains, anklets, finger rings, — wrist-watch cases, watch straps and tighteners, — rivet buttons, tighteners, rivets, zippers and metal marks, when these are used in garments, if the rate of nickel release from the parts of these articles coming into direct and prolonged contact with the skin is greater than 0,5 μg/cm²/week.”
Paragraph 1(c) — a non-nickel coating carries a condition that runs over time: “(c) in articles referred to in point (b) where these have a non-nickel coating unless such coating is sufficient to ensure that the rate of nickel release from those parts of such articles coming into direct and prolonged contact with the skin will not exceed 0,5 μg/cm²/week for a period of at least two years of normal use of the article.”
Paragraph 2 is written about articles: “2. Articles which are the subject of paragraph 1 shall not be placed on the market unless they conform to the requirements set out in that paragraph.” The subject of that sentence in the text is articles, and it is left that way here.

The grouping is drawn by how the object meets the body

Paragraph 1(a) does not describe an ornament. It describes an act: a post assembly that is inserted into a pierced ear or another pierced part of the human body. Whatever such a post assembly is sold as, its place in the paragraph comes from being inserted.

Paragraph 1(b) works the same way one step out from the body. Its heading condition is that the article is intended to come into direct and prolonged contact with the skin; the list that follows is introduced as examples. That list holds earrings, necklaces, bracelets and chains, anklets and finger rings — and then, in the same list, wrist-watch cases, watch straps and tighteners, and rivet buttons, tighteners, rivets, zippers and metal marks when these are used in garments.

So a zip and a metal mark on a garment stand in the same enumeration as a finger ring. The criterion the provision states is contact with the skin, not the trade category the object is sold in. Reading entry 27 as a jewellery rule reads a narrower group than the provision writes.

One further detail of wording belongs to the same reading: in paragraph 1(b) the rate is stated for the parts of these articles coming into direct and prolonged contact with the skin, and paragraph 1(c) repeats that phrasing for coated articles. How any other restriction is written is not read on this page.

Numbers the text read does not give

Each line below is bounded to the entry 27 text of the consolidated version of 11 May 2026, read on 20 August 2026. It says what is not in that text, not what exists in the world.

A total nickel content figure — a percentage by mass for an article or for an alloy — does not appear in the entry 27 text read. The figures it states are release rates.
A numeric definition of “direct and prolonged contact” — in hours, days or number of repetitions — does not appear in the entry 27 text read.
A sample size, a laboratory detection limit and a measurement uncertainty correction factor do not appear in the entry 27 text read.
No alloy, karat, plating thickness or metal trade name appears in the entry 27 text read, so no conclusion about a named material follows from it.
No score, grade, tier or ranking appears: the entry is written as thresholds, and the text read contains no formula that turns a measured release rate into a rating of one item against another.
The phrases “nickel free” and “hypoallergenic” do not appear in the entry 27 text read, and this page makes no finding about what such phrases mean or how they may be used.
Test method names, their versions and the documents that carry them are not dealt with on this page.

Where this reading stops

This is one instrument in one jurisdiction. Entry 27 of REACH Annex XVII is European Union law, and nothing here carries to the United Kingdom, the United States, Türkiye, Canada, China, Japan, India or Australia. Whatever any of those jurisdictions does about nickel is written in its own texts, and none of it can be inferred from this one.

Assessment, surveillance and enforcement procedures are not part of the text read for this page, and nothing about them is worked out here. Neither is the position of any particular item: entry 27 states thresholds on measured release, and a measurement is not something a page, a photograph or an image tool performs.

That last point is worth stating flatly, because this site publishes an image product. No Elanorya feature measures, detects, estimates or verifies nickel release, metal content, plating durability or conformity with any restriction, at any level. Nothing here offers, arranges or implies a laboratory, testing, screening or certification service.

Other entries of the same Annex are not read here. What this page carries is entry 27, in the version named below.

The copy these lines are quoted from

REACH Annex XVII entry 27, consolidated text of 11 May 2026 (CELEX 02006R1907-20260511), read on 20 August 2026. Every quotation on this page comes from that copy, and the paragraph number is named beside each one.

A consolidated text gathers a regulation and its amendments into one document for reading; it does not replace the text published in the Official Journal. This regulation has many consolidated versions, and a change made after 11 May 2026 is not reflected in what is written above.

For the same reason, the statement that entry 27 reads this way is dated rather than standing. It holds for the version named, on the day named. Carrying it forward to a later date is a fresh reading, not an inference from this one.

The habit of naming which copy of a document a quotation comes from is set out at more length on a companion page about marketplace image requirements, linked below.

Questions

Does entry 27 set a maximum nickel content for an alloy used in jewellery?

In the consolidated text of 11 May 2026, read on 20 August 2026, the numbers entry 27 states are rates of nickel release measured per square centimetre per week: less than 0,2 μg/cm²/week in paragraph 1(a) and greater than 0,5 μg/cm²/week as the prohibited case in paragraph 1(b). A percentage by mass for an article or an alloy does not appear in that text.

Why does the entry give two different figures?

Because they belong to two different provisions about two different situations. Paragraph 1(a) covers post assemblies inserted into pierced ears and other pierced parts of the human body. Paragraph 1(b) covers articles intended to come into direct and prolonged contact with the skin, and paragraph 1(c) restates its figure as a condition on a non-nickel coating.

Does the “at least two years” period apply to a stud worn in a piercing?

In the text read, that period appears only in paragraph 1(c), which is about articles referred to in point (b) that have a non-nickel coating. Paragraph 1(a), the provision about post assemblies inserted into pierced parts of the body, states no such period.

Are watch straps and zips really inside the same provision?

Paragraph 1(b) lists wrist-watch cases, watch straps and tighteners, and rivet buttons, tighteners, rivets, zippers and metal marks when used in garments, in the same enumeration as earrings, necklaces, bracelets, chains, anklets and finger rings. The condition the list illustrates is direct and prolonged contact with the skin.

Does this reading tell me anything about the United Kingdom or the United States?

No. This page reads one European Union instrument. Nothing about the United Kingdom or the United States is derived from it, and neither jurisdiction is addressed anywhere on this page.

Can a product photograph, or any Elanorya feature, indicate an item's nickel release?

No. The figures in entry 27 describe measured release across a surface over a week, and no photograph is a measurement. No Elanorya feature measures, detects, estimates or verifies nickel release, metal content, plating durability or conformity with any restriction, and no laboratory, testing or certification service is offered or implied.