Which AI Act obligations took effect in August 2026, which ones slipped, and the compliance work that cannot wait. Written for operators.
If you searched "EU AI Act August 2026 deadline" this month, most of what you found is already wrong. On 29 June 2026 the Council gave its final green light to the Digital Omnibus on AI, the regulation that rewrites the AI Act's calendar. The heavy compliance package for high-risk AI systems, originally due on 2 August 2026, now lands on 2 December 2027 for stand-alone systems and on 2 August 2028 for AI embedded in regulated products.
That is the headline everyone repeats. Here is the part most companies are missing: 2 August 2026 did not become an empty date. The transparency obligations of Article 50 still take effect four days after this article goes live. If you run a chatbot, generate synthetic content, publish AI-written text on matters of public interest, or use deepfake technology in any form, you have obligations this week, not next year.