EU AI Act: What it is, and why it’s a golden opportunity for training providers and course creators

AI is almost everywhere, from our daily workflows to art and education. But as AI becomes more popular, the risks increase as well. This is why the EU has stepped in with the world’s first comprehensive AI regulation: the EU AI Act.

This landmark Act doesn’t affect tech giants and large corporations only. If you’re a training provider or course creator using AI and serving EU learners, this regulation affects you and your clients. Not only because your compliance requirements increase but also because the EU AI Act creates a major opportunity to expand your offerings and become the go-to partner for AI literacy training.

Keep reading to explore:

• A detailed overview of the EU AI Act and how it impacts businesses and training providers
• Enforcement mechanisms and key rollout dates
• Opportunities for training providers and course creators
• A real-world example: How Makai uses LearnWorlds to deliver AI literacy training

* If you’re a training provider interested in creating AI literacy courses aligned with the EU AI Act, keep an eye out for the “💡For training providers” callouts throughout this guide. These highlight compliance tips and course opportunities tailored specifically for education professionals like you.

What the EU AI Act is

The EU AI Act (officially titled Regulation (EU) 2024/1689) is the world’s first comprehensive regulation on artificial intelligence. It was adopted in early 2024 and entered into force on August 1, 2024.

This regulation provides a legal framework for AI systems across the EU. The aim is to ensure that AI used within the Union is safe, respects fundamental rights, and supports trustworthy innovation.

Unlike GDPR, which focuses on data privacy, the EU AI Act targets AI systems. It applies to both EU-based providers and companies outside the EU offering AI-powered tools or services to users within the Union.

These companies need to

1. be compliant with the AI Act regulations
2. ensure their employees are AI literate

Why the EU needed AI rules

AI is already being used to decide who gets a loan, what content we see, how we learn, who gets hired. Without clear rules, this opens the door to discrimination, bias and unchecked automation.

The EU regulation on Artificial Intelligence is part of the EU’s digital strategy to promote trustworthy AI, ie, AI that is safe, transparent, and accountable. It fills a legal gap, setting boundaries on the use of AI. The goal is to protect consumers and fundamental rights while still encouraging innovation and AI adoption across sectors.

The risk-based approach

The EU AI Act introduces a tiered risk framework. The higher the potential risk to safety or rights, the heavier the obligations.

There are four risk categories:

• Unacceptable risk: completely banned
• High risk: permitted with strict conditions
• Limited risk: subject to transparency requirements
• Minimal risk: free to use, no obligations

Unacceptable-risk systems

These AI systems are considered too harmful to be allowed at all. They include technologies that manipulate behavior, exploit vulnerable groups, or pose serious privacy threats.

Examples:

• AI used for social scoring (eg, by public authorities)
• Emotion recognition (eg, in job interviews or schools)
• Real-time biometric surveillance (in public spaces)

These use cases are banned completely under the regulation.

High-risk systems

AI tools under this category are allowed but strictly regulated, since they could significantly impact people’s lives or safety.

While only ‘education and vocational training’ directly applies to most training providers, understanding the others can help you anticipate the compliance needs of clients in those industries and create targeted AI literacy training for them.

This is the list of nine verticals:

1. Biometric identification and categorization
2. Education and vocational training
3. Employment, worker management, and access to self-employment
4. Access to essential private and public services
5. Law enforcement
6. Migration, asylum, and border control
7. Administration of justice and democratic processes
8. Product safety components (e.g. AI in vehicles or medical devices)
9. Critical infrastructure (e.g. power grids)

Providers of high-risk systems must meet pre-market duties like:

• Risk and impact assessments
• Clear documentation and instructions
• Human oversight mechanisms
• Logging and auditability features

Limited risk

The limited-risk category doesn’t impose pre-approval or audits, but it does require transparency notices.

• Inform users when they’re interacting with AI (e.g. a chatbot)
• Label AI-generated content (anything from an ebook to a post on your community)
• Flag AI-generated media like audio, video, and image

Minimal or no risk

The minimal or no risk category covers AI applications that pose negligible or no threat to people’s rights or safety. These applications don’t create compliance obligations like transparency notices or human oversight.

• Automated video captions
• Grammar checkers
• Translation tools
• Course recommendation engines (as long as they don’t process sensitive data)

Compliance duties for training providers

The EU AI Act creates obligations for any organization using AI in services for EU learners:

High risk users

If your AI use falls into the high-risk category, you must:

• Implement a risk management framework
• Ensure strong data governance
• Include human oversight
• Keep logs and documentation

These apply before and during AI system use.

General-purpose AI (GPAI) models

If you build or integrate large language models, image generators, or other GPAI tools into your training, from 2 August 2025 you’ll need to:

• Disclose training methods and datasets used in your AI
• Follow EU copyright law
• Provide technical documentation and usage guidelines
• Flag systemic risks

SME considerations

If you’re a smaller training provider or a startup:

• You may benefit from lighter documentation requirements for limited-risk systems
• Member states must provide AI “sandboxes” where you can test AI safely before launch
• National authorities and the EU AI Office will offer technical assistance to help you comply

Governance, enforcement, and key dates

The EU AI Act also defines who’s responsible for the enforcement of the AI Act. Two core entities will lead this effort: the newly created EU AI Office and national market-surveillance authorities.

The EU AI Act is already in force, but the rules don’t apply all at once. The regulation follows a phased rollout, giving businesses time to adapt. Below is a simplified timeline of what takes effect and when, based on the official roadmap shared by the European Commission’s digital strategy and the European Parliament.

Opportunities for training providers

Article 4 of the regulation explicitly calls on member states to promote AI literacy for the general public, the workforce, and key stakeholders.

The EU doesn’t offer relevant training programs or certificates, though. And this is where training providers can step in.

Demand is already emerging for:

• AI literacy programs for employees, educators, product teams, and business leaders
• SME-focused compliance guides, especially for startups navigating the new rules
• Sector-specific courses on responsible AI use (HR, education, healthcare)
• Code-of-practice training for AI developers and deployers

Additionally, different rules will apply to different risk levels and, with these rules being open to revision, businesses need clear and easy-to-update training. And with much of the Act’s language being technical, organizations will rely on course creators to make the regulation practical and actionable.

This is a rare opportunity for training providers to act fast and become go-to partners in the emerging field of AI literacy training.

💡Two important notes:

1. Since there’s no official EU certificate, you can issue a certificate of completion for your customer, but this does not automatically mean that they’re compliant with the EU AI Act. The certificate only ensures compliance with Article 4 of the regulation, providing proof that AI literacy training has taken place.
2. The European Union has not provided an official definition of what AI literacy means. There are no clear learning objectives, which means there’s flexibility in the type of courses you create and their learning goals.

Makai: a LearnWorlds Academy offering AI literacy training

Pascal Van Laere and Frederik Dooms, ex Google leaders and experts in AI and L&D, founded the Makai Academy in early 2025 with the mission to empower people to use AI ethically and responsibly. The Academy’s AI Literacy Program helps companies train their employees and stay compliant with Article 4 of the EU AI Act.

Makai offers video-based courses that help employees understand how AI works, what the risks are, and how to use AI responsibly. Successful learners are provided with a certificate of completion at the end of the course, while HR departments have access to a dashboard to monitor who has completed their AI literacy training.

Makai covers foundational topics around:

• Introduction to AI and what it can do
• The purpose and requirements that come with the AI EU Act
• Ethical use of AI
• The future of AI

It’s worth noting that for the second module, Makai collaborated with a lawyer’s office specialized in the EU AI Act and GDPR to ensure their content is legally sound. This is a good practice to offer up to date and accurate knowledge.

* Makai works with a shared revenue model and is open to partnerships with other course creators.

Final thoughts: From regulation to opportunity

The EU AI Act isn’t just a legal framework, it’s a turning point in how AI is developed and used across industries. For training providers, it creates a rare opportunity to grow their business while helping organizations achieve AI literacy.

LearnWorlds is the LMS that helps you do just that: build engaging and effective online courses while having access to all the tools you need to sell these courses to businesses. Try LearnWorlds today with a 30-day free trial.

Resources

1. AI Act (Regulation (EU) 2024/1689
2. Governance and enforcement of the AI Act

Androniki Koumadoraki

Androniki is a Content Writer at LearnWorlds sharing Instructional Design and marketing tips. With solid experience in B2B writing and technical translation, she is passionate about learning and spreading knowledge. She is also an aspiring yogi, a book nerd, and a talented transponster.