Packaging teams now have more software to choose from than at any point in the industry’s history. Life-cycle assessment platforms, extended producer responsibility (EPR) fee calculators, recyclability checkers, digital product passport systems and a growing number of AI-assisted design and administration tools are all competing for budget. Most promise to make compliance faster and claims safer. Few do everything they promise, and none replace a person who understands the regulation.
This piece sets out the main categories of tool in use today, what recent product launches and vendor partnerships tell us about where the market is heading, and how a packaging team might choose between them.
The main categories of tool
Six types of software turn up repeatedly in packaging sustainability and compliance work.
Life-cycle assessment (LCA) software compares the environmental footprint of different materials or formats across a defined scope, usually from raw material through to end of life. EPR fee and reporting tools calculate the fees a producer owes under schemes in the EU member states, the UK and US states, and generate the data submissions those schemes require. Recyclability assessment tools score a pack design against a recycling protocol, increasingly with an eye on the PPWR’s forthcoming grading system. Digital product passport (DPP) platforms store and structure the material, supplier and compliance data that packaging will eventually need to expose through a data carrier such as a QR code. Claims substantiation and evidence-management tools link a sustainability statement on pack to the certificates, test reports and supplier declarations behind it. And a newer group of AI-assisted tools apply machine learning to design optimisation, quoting, or document processing inside converter and packaging operations.
These categories overlap in practice. A DPP platform might pull data from an LCA tool. A claims tool might draw on the same recycled-content documentation an EPR report needs. Vendors increasingly pitch a single data layer that feeds several outputs, on the logic that building one clean dataset once is cheaper than building it five times.
Optimisation software: a concrete example
Macfarlane Packaging, a UK protective packaging distributor, illustrates one strand of this market: tools that optimise existing packaging rather than assess it after the fact. Macfarlane Packaging has partnered with Lancaster University to design software intended to help customers reduce excess packaging by an average of 15%. The tool, called Packaging Minimiser, grew out of a UK government-backed research collaboration between the retailer and the university’s operational research group.
The mechanics are straightforward. It uses an algorithm to pinpoint exactly where businesses are shipping empty space and using too much packaging, or the wrong kind, in the process. Macfarlane positions the output as a business case as much as a sustainability one: benefits include parcel weight reduction, reduced transportation carbon emissions, cutting the number of packaging products used, packaging that’s easier to store and compliance with UK and EU packaging waste regulations, like EPR and PPWR.
Scale matters here. UK packaging producers supplied around 6.8 million tonnes of paper, card and plastic packaging in 2024, according to the National Packaging Waste Database. A 15% reduction applied across that volume would be a meaningful tonnage, though it’s worth being clear that this is a vendor’s own test result from its Innovation Lab, not an independently audited figure, and real-world savings will vary by customer and pack type.
LCA as a comparison engine, not a verdict
Antalis Packaging, the paper and industrial packaging distributor, has taken a different route: giving customers access to third-party LCA data rather than building proprietary scoring. Through Sphera’s LCA software and environmental database, Antalis can compare the environmental impact of different packaging solutions across their lifecycle, with access to datasets covering different materials, industries and geographical markets. The underlying dataset is substantial: Sphera’s LCA solution includes more than 20,000 full LCA datasets, covering 80 countries and more than 60 industries, alongside extensive emissions data and industry-specific information.
What stands out is how Antalis frames the tool’s role. Antalis stressed it is not making the choice for the customer. Instead, it provides the data and comparisons needed to understand the potential impact of different options, allowing businesses to consider the findings alongside their own priorities, requirements and supply chains. John Garner, the company’s packaging category director, put it directly: “Customers are increasingly asking us how they can make better packaging choices, but there is no one-size-fits-all answer. What is right for one application may not be right for another. Our role is to provide the evidence that allows customers to understand the differences and make an informed choice.”
The analysis can assess existing packaging and consider the complete lifecycle, from design and raw materials through manufacturing, transport, use, recycling, and end of life. That breadth is the point of LCA software generally: a material that looks better on one axis, say recycled content, can look worse on another, say transport weight or end-of-life processing. The tool surfaces the trade-off. It does not resolve it. A procurement or sustainability manager still has to decide which axis matters most for a given application, supply chain and market.
Where AI is showing up in packaging operations
Away from sustainability scoring, AI is moving fastest into the administrative and commercial side of packaging and label production. HiFlow Solutions, an ERP provider for converters, recently demonstrated what it calls an agentic approach to its platform. The company introduced an AI Quote Agent, alongside six AI-enabled workflows for label and packaging converters, taking a conversational approach to label estimating and quote preparation: users provide job specifications through guided interaction, and the agent builds an estimate for review.
The six workflows cover estimate processing, order processing, supplier delivery processing, supplier price list updates, bill of lading processing and accounts payable processing, capturing and structuring information from emails, PDFs and other incoming documents to reduce manual entry. None of this is sustainability software in the strict sense. It matters to this beat because it shows where converter-side AI investment is actually landing: document extraction and quoting, not recyclability scoring or carbon accounting. Compliance and sustainability-specific AI tools remain comparatively immature, and teams evaluating them should ask what the model was trained on and how outputs are checked, rather than taking a demo at face value.
Claims need an evidence trail, not just a database
A separate, fast-growing need is linking a sustainability claim on pack to defensible proof. As Packaging Gateway sets out, packaging sustainability claims need more than good intentions: companies must be able to connect each claim to reliable, traceable evidence. The practical questions are specific. A bottle described as “made with recycled plastic” raises several questions: does the statement cover the bottle body, the cap and the label? What proportion is recycled? Can the business making the claim trace that figure back to the material supplied?
This isn’t an abstract exercise. From 27 September 2026, new EU consumer rules make it harder for companies to use generic environmental claims such as “eco-friendly” and “green”, putting greater emphasis on specificity, substantiation and credible certification. Claims evidence tools exist to sit underneath the marketing and regulatory copy: they link each stated attribute (recycled content, recyclability, carbon) to the certificate, test report or supplier declaration that supports it, and flag when that evidence is due for renewal. For a packaging team, the value is less in the software itself and more in the discipline it forces: no claim goes on pack without an attached, dated piece of evidence.
Digital product passports: building on data you may already hold
The Digital Product Passport, introduced under the EU’s Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR), is the structural reason packaging teams are being asked to formalise data they used to keep in spreadsheets and supplier emails. From 2027 onwards, a number of product categories sold in the EU will have to feature a Digital Product Passport, offering standardised, accessible data to support sustainable practices and informed decision-making across value chains. Packaging is not yet a confirmed first-wave category in the same way batteries and textiles are, and the exact packaging-specific data carrier requirements under the PPWR are still being worked out through implementing acts, so teams should treat specific packaging DPP dates as unconfirmed until the Commission publishes them.
An argument worth noting from the pharmaceutical sector, which sits outside current DPP scope, is that much of the groundwork already exists elsewhere. Much of this information is already provided by pharmaceutical companies through the GS1 DataMatrix to adhere to existing legislation, even though the sector is excluded from DPP requirements. The scale of what’s being tracked is not trivial: the World Health Organization estimates 85% of the waste generated by healthcare activities is general, non-hazardous waste, and an estimated 150 million blister packs are used by the NHS alone every year in the UK. The lesson for packaging teams in other sectors is that serialisation and traceability systems built for one regulatory purpose, such as track-and-trace or anti-counterfeiting, often capture data that a DPP, EPR report or recyclability assessment can reuse. Building a single structured dataset once, rather than per regulation, is the efficient path.
Recycled content tracking is a good example of why this matters. Under Regulation (EU) 2025/40, minimum recycled content in plastic packaging rises in two steps, first from 1 January 2030 and again from 1 January 2040, with different thresholds depending on whether the packaging is contact-sensitive and what polymer it uses. A data platform that already tracks recycled content by SKU for EPR reporting is far better placed to demonstrate compliance against these rising thresholds, and later to populate a DPP, than one built as a one-off compliance exercise.
What these tools are good at, and what they aren’t
Across all six categories, a pattern holds. Software is good at consistency: applying the same calculation method to every SKU, flagging missing data, and producing an audit trail that a regulator or auditor can follow. It is good at speed: generating in minutes a comparison or estimate that used to take a specialist days. It is good at surfacing problems a busy team might miss, such as a certificate that has lapsed or a pack design that fails a recyclability threshold.
It is weaker at judgement. Deciding whether a lighter pack that costs more to produce is worth it, or whether a recycled-content claim on the cap alone is honest enough to put on the front of pack, still needs a person who understands the brand, the market and the regulation. It is also only as reliable as the data fed into it. An LCA comparison built on generic industry averages will miss supply-chain specifics that a tailored assessment would catch. An EPR fee calculator is only correct if someone keeps the underlying material and weight data current as packs change.
Regulatory uncertainty adds a further limit. Several PPWR implementing and delegated acts remain unpublished, and the Commission’s guidance and FAQ documents (the guidance of 10 June 2026 and the second FAQ edition of 3 August 2026) are being updated as gaps are identified. A tool’s compliance logic is only as current as its last update against that moving target. Any team relying on software for a PPWR obligation should check the tool’s documentation date against the latest official guidance before treating an output as final.
How to choose: a comparison
| Tool category | What it does | Typical inputs | Typical outputs | Best suited for |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| LCA software | Compares environmental impact of materials or formats across a defined lifecycle scope | Material type, weight, transport distance, end-of-life route | Comparative impact scores (carbon, water, resource use) by option | Material selection and design trade-off decisions |
| EPR fee and reporting tools | Calculates producer fees and generates scheme reporting submissions | Packaging weight and material by SKU, sales volumes, jurisdiction | Fee estimates, scheme-ready data files | Multi-jurisdiction producers facing several EPR schemes |
| Recyclability assessment tools | Scores a pack design against a recycling protocol or forthcoming PPWR grade | Pack components, inks, adhesives, barrier layers | Pass/fail or grade-style scores, redesign flags | Design teams preparing for PPWR recyclability grading |
| DPP and data-management platforms | Stores and structures material, supplier and compliance data centrally | Specifications, supplier declarations, certificates, compliance records | Structured, exportable datasets; DPP-ready records | Teams building a single data source for multiple obligations |
| Claims evidence tools | Links each sustainability claim to its supporting certificate or test report | Claim wording, scope, supporting documents | Evidence trail per claim, renewal alerts | Brand and legal teams managing on-pack and marketing claims |
| AI-assisted design and admin tools | Optimises pack dimensions or automates quoting and document processing | Order history, product dimensions, job specifications, incoming documents | Optimised pack sizes, estimates, structured order data | High-volume shippers and converters reducing admin time and void space |
What to do now
- Map what data you already hold for other purposes (track-and-trace, EPR reporting, quality certificates) before buying a new tool to collect it again.
- Ask any vendor what regulatory text or guidance version their compliance logic is built against, and how often it’s updated.
- Treat LCA and recyclability outputs as comparison data, not a final answer. Keep a person accountable for the decision.
- Before putting any sustainability claim on pack, confirm you can point to a specific, current piece of evidence for it, not just a general supplier assurance.
- For PPWR-specific obligations such as recycled content minimums or recyclability grades, check the current official guidance or take legal advice before relying on a tool’s output as proof of compliance.
Sources
- Source: Software partnership aims to tackle packaging overuse, Packaging Europe
- Source: Macfarlane partnership targets packaging waste, Deadline News
- Source: Antalis Packaging Gives Customers the Data to Make More Informed Packaging Choices, Sustainable Packaging News
- Source: Antalis Packaging gives customers the data to make more informed packaging choices, Innovations Food
- Source: HiFlow launches AI quote agent, Labels & Labeling
- Source: How to substantiate packaging sustainability claims, Packaging Gateway
- Source: Why ‘eco-friendly’ packaging claims are becoming harder to make, Packaging Gateway
- Source: Pharma Already Has the Data Foundations that the Digital Product Passport Wants, Sustainable Packaging News
- Source: Pharma already has the data foundations that the digital product passport wants, Converter Magazine