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EU Council Directive 2006/112/EC <1ms Edge Edge Compute

EU VAT Rates 2026: Standard & Reduced Rates for All 28 Countries

Complete 2026 VAT rate table for all 27 EU member states and the United Kingdom: standard and reduced statutory rates, an explicit effective-year stamp, and the national VIES validator for every jurisdiction. This specification documents the exact field layout, checksum rules, and validation behavior so your integration matches EU Council Directive 2006/112/EC without reading the source standard.

Latency: <1ms Edge Availability: 99.99% Standard: EU Directive 2006/112/EC In-Memory Execution
Interactive Edge Workbench

⚡ Live EU VAT Rates 2026: Standard & Reduced Rates for All 28 Countries Interactive Workbench

Test real-time validation and schema parsing for EU VAT Rates 2026: Standard & Reduced Rates for All 28 Countries directly in your browser. Runs in sub-5ms with zero setup.

32KB Demo Cap 60 req/min Burst <2ms V8 Compute Zero Data Retention
input.txt 0 B
output.json demo-ready
Status: Ready
{
  "status": "Click RUN VALIDATION to execute on the Cloudflare edge..."
}
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LLM / MCP
Prompt-Ready Specification for AI Agents llms.txt
Structured format rules and schemas optimized for LLM coding agents and Model Context Protocol tooling.
Raw .md
Official Standard & Validation Protocol Authority: European Commission Taxation & Customs Union (VIES) ↗

Quick Summary: Complete 2026 VAT rate table for all 27 EU member states and the United Kingdom: standard and reduced statutory rates, an explicit effective-year stamp, and the national VIES validator for every jurisdiction. Validates strictly against EU Council Directive 2006/112/EC with sub-5ms in-memory response times.

Latency
<1ms Edge
Standard
EU Directive 2006/112/EC
Version
Max Payload
512 KB
Privacy
In-Memory (0 bytes stored)

Specification & Structural Breakdown

Technical Summary: Validates strictly against EU Council Directive 2006/112/EC. Payloads are parsed in memory and return clean, typed JSON in milliseconds with zero data logged.

Value Added Tax across the European Union is governed by Council Directive 2006/112/EC, which sets a minimum standard rate of 15% and a minimum reduced rate of 5%. Each member state sets its own statutory rates within those floors, while the United Kingdom applies its own regime.

For 2026 the standard rate ranges from 17% in Luxembourg to 27% in Hungary. Reduced rates apply to qualifying supplies such as food, medicines, books, and passenger transport, and range from zero-rated categories to rates close to the standard rate.

Rates are a maintained 2026 snapshot with an explicit effective year. Recent statutory changes include Romania moving to 21% in August 2025, Estonia to 22%, and Finland to 25.5%; confirm the rate in force on the invoice date before billing.

Every jurisdiction below has a dedicated VIES validator page with its national number format, checksum algorithm, and the same rate lookup, available programmatically from GET /api/v1/vat/rates/{country}.

CountryCode2026 Standard RateReduced Rates
AustriaAT20%10%, 13%
BelgiumBE21%6%, 12%
BulgariaBG20%9%, 5%
CyprusCY19%9%, 5%
CzechiaCZ21%12%
GermanyDE19%7%
DenmarkDK25%None
EstoniaEE22%9%
GreeceEL24%13%, 6%
SpainES21%10%, 4%
FinlandFI25.5%14%, 10%
FranceFR20%10%, 5.5%, 2.1%
United KingdomGB20%5%
CroatiaHR25%13%, 5%
HungaryHU27%18%, 5%
IrelandIE23%13.5%, 9%, 4.8%
ItalyIT22%10%, 5%, 4%
LithuaniaLT21%9%, 5%
LuxembourgLU17%14%, 8%, 3%
LatviaLV21%12%, 5%
MaltaMT18%7%, 5%
NetherlandsNL21%9%
PolandPL23%8%, 5%
PortugalPT23%13%, 6%
RomaniaRO21%11%, 9%
SwedenSE25%12%, 6%
SloveniaSI22%9.5%
SlovakiaSK23%19%, 5%

Parsed JSON Response Model

The edge microservice transforms input payloads into strongly-typed hierarchical JSON envelopes with sub-5ms latency:

HTTP 200 JSON Response Envelope
{
  "countryCode": "DE",
  "countryName": "Germany",
  "standardRate": 19,
  "reducedRates": [
    7
  ],
  "effectiveYear": 2026
}

Copy-Paste Integration Code (6 Languages)

Integrate EU VAT Rates 2026: Standard & Reduced Rates for All 28 Countries directly into your production application with native, zero-dependency code snippets in cURL, Node.js, Python, Go, C#, and a ready-to-paste Claude prompt. Get a free API key → (no credit card required):

curl --request POST \
  --url "https://api.stanzaapi.com/vat-validator/api/v1/vat/validate" \
  --header "Content-Type: application/json" \
  --header "x-api-key: YOUR_API_KEY" \
  --data '{
  "vatNumber": "DE123456789"
}'
const response = await fetch("https://api.stanzaapi.com/vat-validator/api/v1/vat/validate", {
  method: "POST",
  headers: {
    "Content-Type": "application/json",
    "x-api-key": process.env.API_KEY || "YOUR_API_KEY"
  },
  body: JSON.stringify({
  "vatNumber": "DE123456789"
})
});

const data = await response.json();
console.log(data);
import requests
import json

url = "https://api.stanzaapi.com/vat-validator/api/v1/vat/validate"
headers = {
    "Content-Type": "application/json",
    "x-api-key": "YOUR_API_KEY"
}
payload = {
    "vatNumber": "DE123456789"
}

response = requests.post(url, json=payload, headers=headers)
print(response.json())
package main

import (
	"bytes"
	"fmt"
	"io"
	"net/http"
	"os"
)

func main() {
	url := "https://api.stanzaapi.com/vat-validator/api/v1/vat/validate"
	payload := []byte(`{"vatNumber":"DE123456789"}`)

	req, _ := http.NewRequest("POST", url, bytes.NewBuffer(payload))
	req.Header.Add("Content-Type", "application/json")
	req.Header.Add("x-api-key", os.Getenv("API_KEY"))

	res, err := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)
	if err != nil {
		panic(err)
	}
	defer res.Body.Close()
	body, _ := io.ReadAll(res.Body)
	fmt.Println(string(body))
}
using System;
using System.Net.Http;
using System.Text;
using System.Threading.Tasks;

class Program
{
    static async Task Main()
    {
        using var client = new HttpClient();
        client.DefaultRequestHeaders.Add("x-api-key", Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("API_KEY") ?? "YOUR_API_KEY");

        var json = @"{""vatNumber"":""DE123456789""}";
        var payload = new StringContent(json, Encoding.UTF8, "application/json");

        var response = await client.PostAsync("https://api.stanzaapi.com/vat-validator/api/v1/vat/validate", payload);
        var content = await response.Content.ReadAsStringAsync();
        Console.WriteLine(content);
    }
}
Integrate the Stanza vat-validator micro-API.

Endpoint: POST https://api.stanzaapi.com/vat-validator/api/v1/vat/validate
Auth header: x-api-key: YOUR_API_KEY
Content-Type: application/json
Request body:
{
  "vatNumber": "DE123456789"
}

Rules:
- Send the request with a 2-second timeout.
- Parse the standard envelope { success, data, meta: { latency_ms, version } }.
- On failure, read { success: false, error, code } and branch on the code.
- Do not retry 4xx responses; surface the error code to the caller.
- Treat invalid-but-well-formed payloads as HTTP 200 with data.valid === false.

Frequently Asked Questions & Technical Notes

Which EU country has the highest and lowest standard VAT rate in 2026?

Hungary has the highest standard VAT rate in the EU at 27%, and Luxembourg the lowest at 17%. Across the full table, the United Kingdom applies a 20% standard rate.

Can EU VAT rates change mid-year?

Yes. Member states can change rates during the year: Romania raised its standard rate from 19% to 21% on 1 August 2025, and Finland moved to 25.5%. This table is a maintained 2026 snapshot with an explicit effective year; always confirm the rate in force on the invoice date.

What are the EU minimum VAT rate thresholds?

Under Council Directive 2006/112/EC the standard rate may not be lower than 15%, and the reduced rate may not be lower than 5%. Reduced rates may apply only to the categories listed in Annex III, such as food, medicines, books, and passenger transport.

How do I validate a VAT number before applying a rate?

Each jurisdiction in the table links to its VIES validator page with the national format rules and checksum algorithm. The same offline validation is available from POST /api/v1/vat/validate, which returns the applicable 2026 rates alongside the validation result.

Related EU & UK VAT Validator & Rate Engine API Formats

Explore sibling specifications and standards in the same developer cluster:

Complementary Enterprise APIs

Seamlessly orchestrate data pipelines across adjacent financial, regulatory, and supply-chain protocols:

All EU & UK VAT Validator & Rate Engine API Formats & Specifications (29) Directory Index ↓
EU VAT Rates 2026: Standard & Reduced Rates for All 28 Countries Austrian VAT Number (UID) Validator & VIES Check Belgian VAT Number (BTW/TVA) Validator & VIES Check Bulgarian VAT Number (ДДС / ЕИК) Check, Format & Rates 2026 Cyprus (CY) VAT Validator & VIES Check Czechia (CZ) VAT Validator & VIES Check German VAT Number (USt-IdNr) Validator & Free VIES Check Danish VAT Number (CVR) Check, Format & VIES Validator 2026 Estonia (EE) VAT Validator & VIES Check Greek VAT Number (AFM / ΑΦΜ) Check, Format & Rates 2026 Spanish VAT (NIF/CIF) Validator & VIES Check Finland (FI) VAT Validator & VIES Check French VAT Number (Numéro TVA) Validator & VIES Check UK VAT Number Check & VIES Lookup | HMRC Validator Croatian VAT Number (OIB) Validator & VIES Check Hungarian VAT Number (Adószám) Check, Format & Rates 2026 Irish VAT Number Check & VIES Validator Italian VAT (Partita IVA) Number Check, Format & Validator Lithuania (LT) VAT Validator & VIES Check Luxembourg (LU) VAT Validator & VIES Check Latvia (LV) VAT Validator & VIES Check Malta (MT) VAT Validator & VIES Check Dutch VAT Number (Btw-nummer) Validator & VIES Check Polish VAT Number (NIP) Validator & VIES Check Portugal (PT) VAT Validator & VIES Check Număr TVA & VAT România (CIF/CUI) Validator & ANAF Check Swedish VAT Number (Momsnr) Validator & VIES Check Slovenia (SI) VAT Validator & VIES Check Slovakia (SK) VAT Validator & VIES Check