Read this important announcement from the European Commission DG Environment regarding transition of the INSPIRE infrastructure to EU horizontal services to ensure long-term continuity. Rest assured, with ArcGIS INSPIRE Open Data, Esri's support of the EU Open Data Directive, data.europa.eu, DCAT-AP, and High-Value Datasets (HVD) aligns with this transition.
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24 June, 2026
Dear member of the INSPIRE community,
The European Commission would like to inform you about the ongoing transition of key INSPIRE infrastructure components to central EU services. This evolution is part of a broader rationalisation and streamlining effort aimed at ensuring the long-term sustainability, resilience, and effectiveness of the European data infrastructure ecosystem. The transition aligns geospatial data management more closely with the EU's broader data framework. While the underlying technical infrastructure will evolve, the objective is to ensure continuity of operations and minimise disruption for users and data providers.
What is changing?
- INSPIRE Geoportal [inspire-geoportal.ec.europa.eu]: By 1 July 2026, the INSPIRE Geoportal will be decommissioned. The European Data Portal (data.europa.eu [data.europa.eu]) will become the single European entry point for geospatial datasets.
- INSPIRE Registry [inspire.ec.europa.eu]: By 1 July 2026, the content of the INSPIRE registry will be migrated to EU Vocabularies [op.europa.eu], ensuring continued access to controlled vocabularies, code lists and semantic assets.
- INSPIRE Validator: As of 1 April 2026, the European Commission has stopped maintenance of the INSPIRE Validator. The validator remains available as open-source software enabling continued community-driven maintenance, national deployments and future extensions.
Ensuring continuity for users
The European Commission remains fully committed to maintaining continuity throughout the transition process. Existing INSPIRE artefacts, including schemas, identifiers, vocabularies and related resources, will remain available. Existing metadata and catalogue services will be integrated into the EU Data Portal ecosystem through GeoDCAT-AP. INSPIRE helpdesk support will remain available at least available until the end of 2026.
INSPIRE Knowledge Base
The INSPIRE Knowledge Base and website will remain accessible until at least the end of 2026. During this period, the platform will continue to provide documentation, guidance and support material while gradually reflecting the updated governance arrangements.
Working together
The transition will be carried out in close cooperation with Member States and stakeholders across the INSPIRE community. The Commission's objective is to ensure a stable, predictable, and transparent transition process that preserves existing investments while positioning INSPIRE within a modern, sustainable, and interoperable European data ecosystem.
With kind regards,
The INSPIRE Team
European Commission
DG Environment
Unit ENV.01 - Strategy, Digitalization, Better Regulation & Economic Analysis
Avenue d’Auderghem, 19
B-1040 Brussels/Belgium
ENV-INSPIRE@ec.europa.eu
