How long does FCC certification take in 2026?

End-to-end FCC certification in 2026 runs 8–16 weeks. The stages: pre-compliance review (1–2 weeks) → lab scheduling (2–4 weeks — this is the main bottleneck since the China/HK lab ban backlogged US and Taiwan labs) → testing itself (1–3 weeks) → TCB review (1–2 weeks) → publication in the FCC database (1–3 business days). The biggest delays come from devices failing first-pass testing, missing documentation (schematics, BOM, RF block diagrams), and TCB clarification rounds. To accelerate: do pre-compliance testing before lab booking, prepare the full documentation package upfront, and check live lab wait times — in 2026, Bay Area Compliance has been faster than Intertek USA. For comparison: 6–8 weeks was typical in 2023.