BCIwiki (bciwiki.com) — Two Chinese national standards for brain-computer interfaces, GB/T 47023-2026 (Information technology — Brain-computer Interfaces — Reference architecture) and GB/T 47127-2026 (Information technology — Brain-computer Interfaces — Multimodal data format), took effect on 1 August 2026. Both were issued on 28 January 2026 by the State Administration for Market Regulation and the Standardization Administration of China, and sit under the BCI subcommittee of the National Information Technology Standardization Technical Committee. Their ICS classification is 35.020. GB/T 47023 specifies a reference architecture for BCI systems together with a user view and a functional view. GB/T 47127 specifies the overall structure of multimodal data, the directory hierarchy, and the content and naming rules for each type of data file; subject directories must carry a sub- prefix, and real names, ID numbers and similar identifying details are prohibited. Chinese press accounts describe the problem being solved as one where EEG recorded by one company could not be read by another company’s algorithms, and moving experimental data between institutions could take days of format conversion.
Both are recommended standards, which is what the T in the GB/T prefix denotes. Under China’s Standardization Law, a mandatory GB standard must be followed and non-compliant products and services may not be made, sold, imported or supplied, whereas a recommended standard is adopted voluntarily and ignoring it breaks no law. Recommended standards acquire practical weight by other routes, chiefly by being cited in ministry rules, written into hospital and government procurement specifications, written into supply contracts, or used as a reference point in medical device technical review. For these two, nothing about 1 August triggers a penalty for non-compliance; what will decide their real force is whether the standard numbers start appearing in tender documents and review opinions.
They are two of 488 national standards that took effect the same day, a batch of 46 mandatory and 442 recommended standards in which BCI was the field Xinhua singled out in its headline. Full texts are available for online reading through the national standards public reading system.
