India sets quality standards for smartphone screen protectors from April 2027

Smartphone screen protectors that do not meet certain specific requirements regarding thickness, dimensions, light transmission, defects and strength and that don’t carry the ‘Standard’ mark, will not be manufactured, stored for sale, imported, sold or distributed in India after April 1, 2027, the government has said in a notification Monday.

This comes after the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY), in a notification issued on September 21, amended the Electronics and Information Technology Goods (Requirement of Compulsory Registration) Order, 2021 - which entails a list of IT and electronic products that must conform to specific Indian Standards (IS), issued by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), mentioned against the products. This list has been maintained and updated since 2012.

The Ministry on Monday added “screen protectors for smartphones” as the 66th item to this list, against IS 19348:2025, originally introduced by BIS in July 2025. Even though the scope for IS 19348:2025 covers smartphones, tablets, laptops, PC screens, E-readers, etc, the MeitY notification specifically only refers to “smartphones”.

Starting April 1, smartphone users will increasingly see products on the market with a required ‘Standard’ mark in India. To be sure, MeitY’s 2021 order does not apply to goods meant for export, which then conform to the specification required by the foreign buyer.

“With a market of over 500 million units a year, this move will catalyse a ₹12,000–16,000 crore quality-driven industry, generate around 60,000 direct and indirect jobs and contribute an estimated ₹2,000 crore in GST revenues. It will also strengthen India’s potential as a global manufacturing and export hub for screen protectors,” said Pankaj Mohindroo, Chairman, India Cellular and Electronics Association.

Currently, over 90% of demand for screen protectors is met through low-cost imports, according to industry stakeholders, resulting in inconsistent quality and a largely unorganised market. When IS 19348:2025 was introduced in July 2025, industry stakeholders had told HT that this is aimed at standardising the quality of screen protectors and ensuring greater consistency, which could also help improve consumer confidence.

Ashok Gupta, Executive Chairman of Optiemus Infracom Ltd, which manufactures tempered-glass screen protectors in India, told HT that the standard could help reduce the industry’s dependence on Chinese suppliers by creating a quality benchmark for locally made products.

“It’s the quality based on a standard which is utmost important for any brand globally. As of now, only India has created that standard and it will help companies to get Make in India screen protectors as another option. All other brands depend only on Chinese brands. It will be an alternative option and [offer] best-quality products with standard and FOG marking, which is very good for brands,” he said.

What does IS 19348:2025 require?

The standard requires the thickness of the glass to remain within 10% of its declared nominal thickness. For normal glass screen protectors, visual light transmission must be more than 89%. Where a privacy film is used, the requirement is at least 59%. The standard also places limits on manufacturing defects. For example, pinholes, inclusions and bubbles above 300 micrometres are not permitted, while larger scratches are also prohibited. It says there should be no visually distinguishable reams, strings, lines or linear/extended faults.

There are also strength requirements. The glass must have a surface compression of at least 500 MPa, while its 10th-percentile fracture stress in the specified four-point bending test must be at least 200 MPa. For mechanical strength, for example. the standard requires a sample of 30 pieces, with the pieces subjected to a four-point bending test. The resulting fracture-strength data is then used to calculate a statistical measure known as the 10th-percentile failure stress.

The standard also sets out sampling procedures for different production lots. Samples are tested for visual defects and light transmission first, followed by checks on thickness, dimensions and cut-side defects, and finally surface compression and mechanical strength.

The standard also specifies marking and packaging requirements. Packages have to carry information such as the source of manufacture, nominal thickness, batch/code number and month and year of manufacture. Each piece of chemically tempered screen-protector glass is required to carry information on its source and year of manufacture.