With the introduction of a bill in Wisconsin, Right to Repair legislation has now been introduced in every single US state.
We’ve been fighting for the simple right to fix everything we own for the last eleven years—and we’ve been joined in that fight by more and more advocates, tinkerers, farmers, students, and lawmakers. Today, that movement has touched every corner of the country. Lawmakers in every state in the union have filed legislation demanding access to the parts, tools, and documentation we need for repair. This year alone, legislation is active in 24 states.
One in Five Americans Is Protected by Right to Repair Legislation
Some of those laws have passed: Five states (New York, California, Minnesota, Oregon, and Colorado) have passed electronics Right to Repair legislation. One in five Americans lives in a state that has passed Right to Repair—and the remaining states are working hard to restore repair competition.
“Here, there and everywhere—people just want to fix their stuff,” said PIRG’s Senior Right to Repair Campaign Director Nathan Proctor. “Americans are fed up with all the ways in which manufacturers of everything from toasters to tractors frustrate or block repairs, and lawmakers are hearing that frustration and taking action.”
iFixit’s Eleven Years of Advocacy
We’ve been boots-on-the-ground fighting for Right to Repair since the very beginning, working to develop and testifying on behalf of the first electronics bill, introduced in South Dakota in 2014. Since then, we’ve worked closely with our US advocacy partners, Repair.org and PIRG, to advance legislation.
“Now that Wisconsin filed their first Right to Repair legislation, we’ve completed the sweep of getting bills filed in all 50 states. Our legislative map no longer has any blanks,” said Gay Gordon-Byrne, Executive Director at Repair.org. “This proves that Right to Repair is needed everywhere—and we are well on our way towards making that happen.”
When we first got involved in Right to Repair, it felt like an uphill battle. Manufacturers told legislators there was no problem—so we brought in repair professionals, did surveys, and shared our repairability expertise to prove that things were really becoming increasingly hard to fix. Manufacturers told legislators that sharing repair information would make it impossible for them to protect their trade secrets and would be dangerous to customers—so we brought in experts, shared data, and proved that repair information is not protected and changing batteries isn’t dangerous.
Over time, more and more legislators joined the fight. The message is simple: If you bought it, you should be able to fix it. And soon, companies started to work with us instead of against us. Now, Google is a major supporter of Right to Repair legislation in the US, and even Apple has come on board to support some laws.
“This is more than a legislative landmark—it’s a tipping point. We’ve gone from a handful of passionate advocates to a nationwide call for repair autonomy,” said Kyle Wiens, CEO of iFixit. “People are fed up with disposable products and locked-down devices. Repair is the future, and this moment proves it.”
We’re Not Done Fighting
Having introduced bills in all 50 states is a massive milestone. It means more pressure on lawmakers, more attention from manufacturers, and more opportunities for all of us to demand repair-friendly products. But we’re not done yet. We’ll keep pushing for stronger laws, better standards, and a future where repair autonomy is a given, not a privilege.
Thank you for being part of this journey. Let’s keep fixing what matters.
3 comentários
I appreciate the work Ifixit does to bring awareness around right to repair. And I think Ifixit needs to be more realistic with what these laws are really doing to prevent companies from doing anti competitive things to prevent repairs. My perception is that Ifixit want these actions to look like a win, but in reality most of these laws have so many exceptions and loopholes that they really don't seem to target real anti-repair problems. Also please stop giving Apple breaks. there hardware is the most anti-repair hardware on the planet. And if they support legislation, they do the exact opposite with there design choices and that does not appear to be changing. The are the biggest contributor to the impact on the planet by designing hardware and software to be hard to fix and the activation locking technology its destroying the reusability market.
Scott Larson - Responder
Please frame it for all types of audiences:
"It is my Republican 'freedom of ownership' to own my thing and I fix it too. It is my Republican right"
"It is my Libertarian 'I do what I want with the equipment I bought -- not leased'. it is my Libertarian right to have that freedom"
"It is my Democrat common man right to fix MY-equipment, the way I want"
Pre m - Responder
I'm a regular fixer of anything that can be repaired, but unfortunately, despite campaigns and assurances otherwise, many more domestic items are being manufactured in a way that renders them unrepairable.
For example, I have recently purchased a new Hoover vacuum cleaner and, whilst it seems to work well, the mains lead is rather short to cover the area of my house.
No problem I thought, I will simply replace the mains lead with a longer one as I have done on various cleaners in the past. Well, I now find this new cleaner is impossible to open up to change the lead or repair anything. Searching the internet, it seems many recent vacuum models including Hoover and Shark are not designed to be opened or repaired.
This seems like such a massive step backwards to me, when manufacturers are making such common domestic goods to be just discarded when they fail.....
Capt.Radar - Responder