Aarhus: The EU Digital Identity Wallet faces a hard deadline in late December, and only one member state has launched its app. Denmark released its wallet, called AltID, on 3 June 2026, according to an independent rollout tracker that reports the status of all 27 countries as of October 2026. Every other government is still testing, upgrading or preparing.
The legal clock dates back to the first implementing acts, which entered into force on 24 December 2024 under Regulation (EU) 2024/1183. Each member state must offer at least one Digital Identity Wallet roughly 24 months later, around 24 December 2026. The tracker gives no exact day, because the date follows from that 24-month period.
Progress on the Digital Identity Wallet looks uneven. Germany, France and Italy run public sandboxes, although France has not yet certified its app. Bulgaria, Finland, the Netherlands and Romania have published developer material without a public sandbox. Nine countries, among them Austria, Belgium, Greece and Poland, have confirmed that an existing national app will be upgraded, and nine more, including Spain and Sweden, have announced plans without a sandbox. Cyprus has not confirmed an upgrade path.
Certification is the biggest open question. No wallet had passed the EU certification scheme by October, and the Commission has doubted that all 27 states will meet the deadline. ENISA’s draft scheme closed its public consultation on 30 April 2026, so national bodies still need to decide which wallets they certify first. Only 16 of 27 countries took part in the 2025 Launchpad testing, which suggests that preparation has been uneven for some time.
Germany shows how slow the final stretch can be. Its state wallet sandbox opened in January 2026, but a first public stage is planned only for early January 2027, and private-provider certification is expected roughly twelve months after that launch. A government that misses December will not necessarily face immediate penalties, yet the delay would weaken the Digital Identity Wallet and its promise of one trusted identity across borders.
The wider rollout depends on businesses as much as governments. Regulated private services, including banks, insurers, telecoms and energy providers that must use strong customer authentication, have to accept the Digital Identity Wallet from around 24 December 2027. Very large online platforms face the same duty. Early wallets will mainly offer identification and a few credentials, while signatures and pseudonyms arrive later.
For citizens, the practical test comes in the first months of 2027. If more wallets reach certification and relying parties register in time, the Digital Identity Wallet could become a daily tool for opening accounts, proving age and signing documents. If not, Denmark’s early launch will remain the exception that proves how far the other 26 countries still have to travel.
