What is the difference between FGI 2022 and FGI 2026?
The 2026 edition is the most structural revision in FGI’s history: the documents were renamed from “Guidelines” to “FGI Codes” containing only enforceable minimum requirements, with all advisory material moved to the new digital FGI Handbooks. Beyond the restructure, 2026 adds new facility-type chapters, new clinical requirements (including the first minimum standards for medical/psychiatry units), revised room sizes and clearances, and new planning requirements for procedure and operating rooms.
The structural changes
- Guidelines → Codes. Minimum requirements only; cleaner enforceability. Advisory content (former appendices) expanded into the Handbooks.
- FGI Handbooks. Digital subscription; include full Code text plus guidance, diagrams, checklists, best practices — maintained continuously between four-year Code cycles.
- FGI OneSource. New digital platform for all FGI publications and technical resources.
Notable content changes
- New chapters: short-term outpatient care facilities; residential behavioral and mental health treatment facilities.
- Medical/psychiatry units (MPUs): first minimum requirements for these units in any FGI edition.
- Room sizes and clearances: revised, with bed clearances consolidated into Common Elements (36″ side, 36″/48″ foot).
- Procedure and operating rooms: revised planning requirements.
- Clinical space programming: new requirements for determining the number and types of exam, procedure, operating, and imaging rooms.
- Water age: new requirements to minimize water age (Legionella risk).
- Rehab: updated room sizes and clearances for rehabilitation hospitals.
- Residential: new minimum single-occupancy percentages for most residential facility types.
- Rural emergency hospitals: revised design considerations for the new REH provider type.
- ED signage: new requirements for emergency entrance and directional signage.
What it means for your project
If your state adopts 2026, you’re designing to a reorganized, more enforceable document — and the advisory guidance you used to find in appendices now lives behind a Handbook subscription. Budget for the subscription; the guidance didn’t disappear, it moved.
The biggest FGI restructure ever — plan for it.
See the FGI 2026 compliance guide and which edition your state enforces.
FAQ
When was the 2026 FGI edition published?
FGI launched the 2026 FGI Codes and Handbooks on August 31, 2026, with the digital FGI OneSource platform.
Is the 2026 edition still called the “Guidelines”?
No — renamed the “FGI Codes” (minimum requirements only). Advisory material moved to the FGI Handbooks.
What’s the single biggest content addition in 2026?
The first minimum requirements for medical/psychiatry units (MPUs), plus new chapters for short-term outpatient care and residential behavioral health facilities.