EU E-Invoicing Mandates by Country (2026 to 2030)

Last checked: 24 October 2026. Every entry links to the source it was checked against. This page is general information, not legal or tax advice. Rules are changing fast; confirm with the national tax authority or an adviser before acting.

Eight EU countries already require businesses to exchange structured e-invoices with each other, and adopted laws take that to ten by the end of 2027. From 1 July 2030, EU law requires structured e-invoices and digital reporting for cross-border B2B sales inside the EU in every member state.

This tracker shows, country by country, who must send and receive e-invoices, from when, in which format, and whether a plain PDF invoice is still valid. It covers all 27 EU member states plus the United Kingdom, Norway and Switzerland.

Key numbers

• 8 of 27 EU countries have a domestic B2B e-invoicing obligation in force today: Italy, Romania, Belgium, Croatia, Poland, Greece, France and Germany (Germany: receiving only, until 2027).
• 10 by the end of 2027 under adopted law (adds Germany issuing, Slovakia, Spain).
• 12 by the end of 2028 under adopted law (adds Latvia, Slovenia); 15 if Bulgaria, Luxembourg and Ireland adopt their plans as drafted.
• 27 of 27 must use structured e-invoices for intra-EU B2B from 1 July 2030 (ViDA).
• 11 EU countries have no domestic B2B e-invoicing date at all.

What changes in the next 12 months

Spain's VeriFactu billing-software rules have legal dates of 2027-01-01 and 2027-07-01, but the government announced on 2026-10-05 a further delay to October 2028 (press note, not yet in the official gazette).

Country table: all 30 countries

"Plain PDF valid?" means: is an emailed PDF, with no structured data, still a valid invoice for a domestic sale between two businesses established in that country. Each row links to the sources it was checked against on 24 October 2026.

Download the data (CSV) JSON

Statuses: Live = obligation in force for at least some businesses. Partial = sector-only or only on buyer request. Legislated = adopted law, not yet in force. Announced = plan, bill or draft. None = nothing beyond EU default rules and public-sector invoicing.

The full data set, with a source URL and check date for every field (330 fields across the 30 countries), is available as CSV and JSON.

Are PDF invoices banned in the EU?

No. EU law does not ban PDF invoices, and neither does ViDA in general.

• Today: the VAT Directive defines an electronic invoice as one issued and received "in any electronic format" (Article 217). An emailed PDF is a valid invoice if the buyer accepts it.
• Where countries differ: since 14 April 2025 each country may require structured e-invoices for domestic sales without asking the EU for permission (Article 218, as amended by Directive 2025/516). Where a country does so, a plain PDF stops being a valid invoice for the sales in scope. That is already the case in Italy, Romania, Belgium, Croatia, Poland and, for in-scope firms, Greece and France.
• From 1 July 2030: the EU definition changes to "a structured electronic format which allows for its automated and electronic processing" (new Article 217). Cross-border B2B sales inside the EU then need structured e-invoices everywhere. Countries may still accept paper or PDF for sales outside the new reporting rules, and the Directive sets no end date for that option (new Article 218).
• Hybrid PDFs: a PDF with the full invoice data embedded in structured form, such as Factur-X or ZUGFeRD, counts as an electronic invoice if all reportable data is in the structured part (Directive 2025/516, recital 9).
• The "2034" myth: some guides mention a transition "until 31 December 2034". The adopted text contains no such date. The only later deadline is 1 January 2035, for countries that already ran real-time reporting before 2024 to align their systems.

A PDF also remains useful as a human-readable copy alongside the structured invoice; Spain even requires large issuers to send one alongside the structured invoice for the first 12 months, unless the buyer opts out.

How to check if a PDF invoice is digitally signed

A digital signature is not the same as a scanned or typed signature on the page. It is data inside the file that ties the PDF to a certificate and shows whether anything changed after signing. Whether it is qualified depends on the certificate: a qualified signature or seal comes from a provider on an EU trusted list. Three free ways to check:

1. Adobe Acrobat Reader (free, Windows and Mac). Open the PDF and open the Signatures panel. Adobe's help describes the steps: in the Signatures panel, select Options, then Validate Signatures, and read the Signature Validation Status. For the certificate, choose Signature Properties, then Show Signer's Certificate (Adobe: validating digital signatures). If the Signatures panel lists no signatures, the file has no digital signature. Acrobat judges trust against its own list of trusted certificates, so a green result there does not by itself say "qualified".
2. The European Commission's DSS demonstration validator (free, in the browser). Upload the PDF at ec.europa.eu DSS validation. It checks the signature against the EU trusted lists and reports a level: QESig for a qualified electronic signature and QESeal for a qualified electronic seal (the categories in the Commission's QES validation algorithm). The Commission says the demo is for testing purposes only, so avoid uploading invoices with personal or confidential data; use it on a sample or a non-sensitive copy.
3. pdfsig (free, command line, Linux and Mac). Part of the Poppler PDF tools: pdfsig invoice.pdf lists each signature, the signer's name, whether the signed bytes are intact and whether the certificate is trusted. It runs locally, so the file never leaves your computer.

What the results look like, from test files made for this page (a fictional invoice signed with a self-made, non-qualified certificate):

A genuine qualified signature should show as valid and trusted, with the QESig or QESeal level in the EU validator. Tested on 24 October 2026 with the DSS demonstration web app 6.5 and Poppler pdfsig; Acrobat Reader was not tested for this page.

PDFs will keep arriving for years in any case: bank statements, receipts and invoices from suppliers outside a mandate. DocFig's bank statement converter turns a PDF statement into an Excel or CSV file with every row checked against the printed balances, and the PDF password remover opens locked statements in the browser.

Questions

What is ViDA?

"VAT in the Digital Age", Council Directive (EU) 2025/516, in force since 14 April 2025. Its e-invoicing part makes structured e-invoices and transaction-by-transaction digital reporting mandatory for intra-EU B2B sales from 1 July 2030, sets EN 16931 as the default standard, requires those invoices within 10 days, and abolishes EC Sales Lists. Its other parts cover platforms in short-term rental and passenger transport (2028 to 2030) and a single VAT registration (from 2028-07-01).

Does ViDA force every country to mandate domestic B2B e-invoicing?

No. It allows it, without a special derogation. Domestic digital reporting is also optional. Eleven EU countries have announced no domestic date.

What is the difference between e-invoicing and e-reporting?

E-invoicing means the invoice itself is a structured file exchanged between businesses. E-reporting means invoice or transaction data is sent to the tax authority. Some countries do both through one platform (Italy SdI, Poland KSeF, Romania RO e-Factura). Others report data without mandating e-invoices (Hungary since 2018, Spain SII for large taxpayers).

What is Peppol?

An international network and document standard for exchanging e-invoices through certified providers. Belgium, Slovakia, Norway and the planned UK and Irish systems use it for B2B. Peppol BIS Billing 3.0 is a format that complies with EN 16931.

What is EN 16931?

The European standard for the data content of an e-invoice, with approved syntaxes (UBL and CII). Public bodies across the EU must accept it under Directive 2014/55/EU, since 18 April 2019 for central government.

Does this apply to businesses outside the country?

Mostly not. Most domestic mandates cover businesses established in that country (for example Croatia, Romania, Poland, Italy, Luxembourg). Non-established businesses should check each country's scope.

Is Germany's e-invoice mandate already in force?

Partly. Since 1 January 2025 every German business must be able to receive structured e-invoices. The obligation to issue them starts on 1 January 2027 for businesses with prior-year turnover above EUR 800,000, and on 1 January 2028 for all.

What happens to old PDF invoices and bank statements?

E-invoicing mandates apply to new invoices issued from each start date. Archived PDFs, receipts, foreign suppliers' invoices and bank statements will keep arriving as documents for years, and retention rules for past records are unchanged by these mandates. To get the transactions out of a PDF bank statement, the bank statement to Excel converter turns it into a checked spreadsheet.

Method and sources

Each country record was checked on 24 October 2026 against the national tax authority, ministry of finance, official gazette or EU legislation (EUR-Lex), and the European Commission's eInvoicing country factsheets. Of 330 sourced fields, 280 cite a primary source. Where sources disagree, the data set lists both. Where a value could not be confirmed, it is marked unconfirmed. The Commission factsheets lagged national sources for Greece, Spain and Germany at the time of checking.

Unconfirmed or disputed at the time of checking: Greece phase 2 dates (AADE release read through press reports), Poland's penalty start (bill pending), Slovakia's tolerance period (bill pending), France's penalty amounts, Belgium's penalty amounts, the UK start day within April 2029, and the Netherlands domestic reporting date (2031 per the cabinet letter, 2032 in earlier advice).

DocFig, which converts bank statements and financial PDFs to Excel and CSV, maintains this tracker. Spotted a change or an error? Send it with a source through the contact page.

More DocFig data: which UK banks make Making Tax Digital easy, and all studies and data.

Last checked: 24 October 2026. Not legal or tax advice.