Invoice requirements in Germany

Invoice fields to review

Use this checklist to compare your draft with the local guidance. Applicability can depend on the parties, transaction, tax status, and document type.

• ✓A full invoice normally identifies the supplier and customer by full name and address, gives the supplier's tax number issued by the tax office or VAT identification number, and carries an issue date and a unique, sequential invoice number. A supplier may use separate number series if they remain uniquely identifying.
• ✓Describe the quantity and usual commercial designation of goods, or the nature and extent of services, sufficiently precisely to identify what was supplied. State the time of supply or completion, and the date of any advance payment if that date differs and is known.
• ✓For each VAT rate or exemption, show the net taxable amount, the applicable rate and the VAT amount. State a legally applicable exemption, reverse-charge or other special treatment; show reductions agreed in advance when they affect the taxable amount.
• ✓An invoice should identify advance payments and amounts already paid when relevant. For reverse-charge transactions, include the prescribed note that tax liability is shifted to the customer, along with any additional details required for the transaction category.
• ✓Small invoices with a gross total not exceeding €250 can use simplified content. Generally this includes the supplier's name and address, issue date, quantity and type or nature and extent of supply, gross amount, and applicable rate or exemption information. Special invoice categories may have their own minimum content.
• ✓A small-business supplier using the German Kleinunternehmer VAT treatment must not itemize VAT as if it were collected. The invoice should identify the small-business treatment using the current required note; the special status does not remove all invoice and recordkeeping obligations.

Tax notes

Electronic invoicing

Since 1 January 2025, an in-scope German E-Rechnung must be structured and machine-processable; a simple PDF is not one. Domestic businesses must be able to receive them, and an email inbox suffices. Suppliers may generally use paper or, with customer consent, another format through 2026; suppliers with prior-year turnover up to €800,000 may do so through 2027. Consumer invoices, qualifying small invoices, tickets, Kleinunternehmer supplies and other statutory exceptions are excluded. Public-procurement rules separately require e-invoices for some public authorities.

Record retention

The VAT Act generally requires invoice retention for eight years. Preserve structured invoices in their received electronic form and keep readable access. Other tax or accounting circumstances may require additional retention.