Toy Inspection | Basic Safety Regulations for Toy Inspection

The core objective of toy inspection and safety testing is to ensure that toys placed on the market protect children's lives and health to the greatest extent possible during their foreseeable normal use, avoiding injuries caused by design, manufacturing process, or material defects, and safeguarding consumer rights. Safety requirements are intended to prevent various risks that children may encounter during normal use or reasonable abuse, including poisoning (toxic and other hazardous substances), burns, suffocation, ingestion or inhalation of foreign objects, falls, electric shock, drowning, and other mechanical injuries (such as cuts, lacerations, abrasions, eye injuries, head injuries, and hearing damage). The inspection standard system primarily covers four key performance areas: mechanical and physical properties , flammability , chemical properties , and electrical properties .

In terms of mechanical and physical properties , toys and their components and fasteners must have sufficient mechanical strength and stability when used to withstand the stress of use and prevent damage caused by breakage and deformation; accessible edges, protrusions, ropes, wires and fasteners must be carefully designed and manufactured to minimize the risk of contact injury; the design structure of moving parts should avoid or minimize danger to the human body.

Toys must ensure that there is no risk of strangulation or suffocation caused by blockage of the external airway of the mouth and nose; the size of the components should avoid wedging into the mouth and throat or blocking the airway and causing suffocation; toys for children under 36 months and their detachable parts must be of a size that cannot be swallowed or inhaled; the packaging must also eliminate the risk of strangulation or suffocation caused by blockage of the airway; toys mixed with food must be individually packaged and of safe size; toys that are firmly attached to food and that require food to be eaten before they can be touched are prohibited, and other parts directly attached to food must meet suffocation prevention requirements.

The design of water toys must reduce the risk of loss of buoyancy or support; toys that constitute enclosed spaces must be equipped with exits that are easy to open from the inside; toys that can be moved by users should be equipped with a braking system that is easy to operate, matches the kinetic energy, and does not cause harm, and electrically driven ride-on toys must limit the maximum design speed; the kinetic energy and form of projectile toys and their projectiles must not cause harm to users or others; the temperature of the toy's accessible surface and the temperature and pressure of the liquid/gas contained within should not cause burns, scalds, or overflow injuries (except for those required for normal function); the pulse and continuous noise of sound toys must not damage hearing; activity toys must reduce the risk of squeezing and restricting body parts, entanglement with clothing, and the risk of falling and impacting drowning;

The design and manufacturing of simulated weapon toys must ensure that they are not identified as simulated guns, must not use gunpowder as a launch energy source, key components must not be made of metal or other harmful materials, main parts must have two or more bright colors (more than half of the area and black/gray-black/imitation metal coatings are prohibited), and the appearance, size, proportion and structure must be significantly different from standard firearms.

Regarding flammability , toys must not pose a fire hazard in children's environments. Their materials must meet at least one of the following requirements: non-combustible when directly exposed to a fire source, extinguish immediately when removed from a fire source (no continued combustion), slow flame spread after ignition, or be designed to delay combustion. Toys containing hazardous substances/preparations for their intended function (such as chemical experiment kits) must not contain substances that could become flammable due to the volatilization of non-combustible components.

Aside from toy percussion caps, toys themselves must not be explosive or contain harmful explosives. Chemical toys are particularly prohibited from containing substances that explode when mixed due to reaction or heating, substances that explode when mixed with oxidizing substances, or volatile components that are flammable and can form explosive gas/air mixtures in the air.

In terms of chemical properties , toys must not expose chemicals that pose a health hazard after normal use and abuse testing, and the materials used must comply with national regulations on banned hazardous substances. In toy components intended for specific age groups, the content of migratable elements (antimony, arsenic, barium, cadmium, chromium, lead, mercury, and selenium) must not exceed the specified maximum allowable limits. This requirement applies to components with the potential for exposure through swallowing, licking, sucking, or prolonged skin contact; components not exposed through these routes are exempt.

In addition to complying with cosmetic regulations, toy cosmetics must also meet the limits for migratable elements used in finger paints. Liquids in toys must be kept out of reach of children and, if possible, must be safe. The content of six plasticizers (DBP, BBP, DEHP, DNOP, DINP, and DIDP) in accessible plasticized materials must not exceed the prescribed limits.

In terms of electrical performance , the rated voltage of the toy power supply and the voltage difference between accessible parts shall not exceed 24V DC or equivalent AC; the same applies to the voltage difference between internal conductors, unless it can still ensure no risk of harmful electric shock when damaged.

Components that may come into contact with hazardous electrical sources and their wires/conductors must be adequately insulated and mechanically protected to prevent electric shock. Electrical toys must be designed to ensure that any temperature rise on directly accessible surfaces will not cause burns to the user. Under foreseeable fault conditions, toys must provide protection against electrical hazards caused by the electrical source and have adequate fire protection. Although power transformers, battery chargers, and adapters are not considered essential parts of a toy, they must comply with relevant national electrical safety standards.

Toys with electronic control systems must be designed to ensure safety and reliability in normal use, as well as in the event of system failure or malfunction caused by external factors.