Article 98 — Committee procedure (EU AI Act)

Article 98 of Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 — Committee procedure. Official text, practical interpretation, key obligations and compliance implications.

Official Text Summary

Article 98 of Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 (the EU AI Act) is a procedural provision located in Title XI, which governs delegation of power and committee procedure. It establishes that the European Commission shall be assisted by a committee within the meaning of Regulation (EU) No 182/2011 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 16 February 2011 laying down the rules and general principles concerning mechanisms for control by Member States of the Commission's exercise of implementing powers (the Comitology Regulation).

Where reference is made to this paragraph, Article 5 of Regulation (EU) No 182/2011 applies — meaning the examination procedure governs the adoption of relevant implementing acts. Under the examination procedure, the committee must deliver an opinion by qualified majority. Where the committee delivers a positive opinion, the Commission may adopt the implementing act. Where the committee delivers a negative opinion, the Commission may not adopt the act, although it may submit a revised proposal to the committee or refer the matter to the appeal committee. Where no opinion is delivered, the Commission may adopt the implementing act unless a simple majority of committee members opposes it.

This provision reflects standard EU institutional practice for delegating technical implementing power to the Commission while maintaining structured Member State oversight. It ensures that technically complex or politically significant implementing measures taken under the EU AI Act — such as those relating to classification of high-risk systems, common specifications, or harmonised standards — are subject to democratic scrutiny before becoming binding.

What This Means in Practice

Article 98 operates primarily at the institutional level and does not directly impose obligations on AI developers, providers, deployers, or national competent authorities in their day-to-day compliance work. However, it has significant indirect effects on how the regulatory framework evolves and becomes binding in practice.

When the Commission needs to adopt implementing acts under the EU AI Act — for example, to establish or update the list of high-risk AI systems in Annex III, to adopt common specifications for high-risk AI systems where harmonised standards are absent or insufficient, or to specify formats for EU declarations of conformity — it must follow the committee procedure established in Article 98. This means proposals are reviewed by a standing committee of Member State representatives before adoption, introducing a layer of collective oversight.

For compliance professionals and legal teams, this matters because it determines how quickly and under what conditions binding technical requirements can be updated or clarified. If the Commission wishes to add a new category of high-risk AI system or refine technical requirements via implementing act, the committee procedure governs the timeline and political feasibility of that change.

For policy stakeholders and industry associations, the committee procedure is a key lever for influencing secondary legislation under the AI Act. Member State representatives on the committee can block or modify implementing acts that are disproportionate or technically unsound, providing a safeguard against overly prescriptive or poorly calibrated technical rules.

Practically, operators should monitor Commission implementing acts adopted under the AI Act and track whether they passed through the committee procedure smoothly or faced opposition, as this signals the political durability of the resulting rules.

Key Obligations

• The European Commission must submit draft implementing acts to the committee before adoption, ensuring Member State review and input at the technical and political level.
• The committee operates under the examination procedure (Article 5 of Regulation (EU) No 182/2011), requiring a qualified majority opinion from Member State representatives for the Commission to proceed with adoption.
• Where the committee issues a negative opinion, the Commission is generally prevented from adopting the implementing act in its submitted form and must revise or escalate the proposal.
• Where no opinion is delivered and a simple majority of committee members opposes the act, the Commission must refrain from adopting it.
• The Commission must act in accordance with the procedural rules of Regulation (EU) No 182/2011 in all exercises of implementing powers where Article 98 is invoked, maintaining institutional accountability and transparency.
• Member States retain collective oversight over the technical and administrative shape of the EU AI Act's implementing framework through their participation in the committee.

Relationship to Other Articles

Article 98 sits within Title XI alongside Article 97, which governs the exercise of the delegation of power (the delegated acts procedure), and must be read in conjunction with the specific substantive provisions of the AI Act that expressly grant the Commission implementing powers.

Key articles that trigger the committee procedure include Article 7 (updating the list of high-risk AI systems in Annex III), Article 14 and Article 15 (implementing acts on human oversight and accuracy requirements), Article 41 (common specifications for high-risk AI systems), and Article 51 (registration obligations). Each of these provisions, where they empower the Commission to act via implementing act rather than delegated act, routes through the Article 98 procedure.

Article 98 should also be read alongside Recitals explaining the institutional design choices of the AI Act, and in the broader context of Regulation (EU) No 182/2011, which remains the governing framework for how the committee operates, votes, and resolves disagreements. The distinction between delegated acts (Article 97) and implementing acts (Article 98) is constitutionally significant under EU law and determines the scope of Member State and Parliamentary oversight.

Compliance Timeline

Article 98 entered into force on 1 August 2024, the twentieth day after publication of Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 in the Official Journal of the European Union. As an institutional procedural provision, it applies immediately and continuously from that date, since the Commission's need to adopt implementing acts arose from the moment the Regulation entered force.

The relevance of Article 98 intensifies as the AI Act's phased application schedule triggers substantive obligations: prohibited AI practices became applicable from 2 February 2025; GPAI model obligations apply from 2 August 2025; obligations for high-risk AI systems under Annex III apply from 2 August 2026 (with a further extension to 2 August 2027 for certain systems already subject to conformity assessment under other Union law). Each of these application milestones is accompanied by implementing acts that the Commission must adopt in advance — all routed through the Article 98 committee procedure.

Compliance teams should track the Commission's work programme for AI Act implementing acts to anticipate how Article 98 will shape the timing and content of binding technical requirements across the phased rollout.