California AI Transparency Act Summary: Who Must Comply, and by Which Date

 

People keep calling this one deadline. It is four groups of companies with three different dates, and mixing them up is why so many plans are wrong.

What the law asks for

If a machine made it, say so.

Big AI companies must put a visible label on the images, video and sound their tools produce. They must hide a tag inside the file so software can read it. And they must give the public a free tool to check any file.

The date that changed

SB 942 was signed on 19 September 2024. It said the rules start 1 January 2026.

AB 853 was signed on 13 October 2025 and pushed the start to 2 August 2026, adding three more types of company. Many pages online still print the old date because nobody went back to fix them. Here are the correct dates for the AI Transparency Act.

Group 1: big AI companies, from 2 August 2026

You build the AI tool, it has over a million users a month, and people in California can use it. You owe all three duties. The free checker also has to return the origin info it finds, not just a yes or no.

Group 2: big websites, from 1 January 2027

Social sites, file sharing sites, messaging apps and search engines above the size limit. They must spot AI tags in content passing through and show users what they found.

Group 3: model download sites, from 1 January 2027

Sites where you can download AI models or code. They cannot knowingly hand out a model that skips the labelling.

Group 4: device makers, from 1 January 2028

Cameras, phones with cameras or microphones, and voice recorders sold in California must let users add a hidden tag naming the maker.

What it costs to get wrong

$5,000 per violation, and every day counts as a fresh one. Thirty days is $150,000. The Attorney General, a city attorney or a county counsel brings the case.

Why careful teams still miss it

Nobody deals with this law on its own. If you serve California users you are almost certainly under CCPA too, probably GDPR, maybe LGPD.

Four laws. Four sets of dates. One person tracking them in a spreadsheet on top of their real job. That is how a seven month change goes unnoticed.

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