Adds German VAT to a net price or strips it back out of a gross one, at the standard 19% rate, the reduced 7% rate, or a rate you enter yourself.
Adding tax is a multiplication; removing it is not a subtraction. To take 19% VAT out of a gross price you divide by 1.19 rather than subtracting 19%, because the tax was calculated on the net figure and not on the gross. Subtracting instead is the single most common error in VAT arithmetic and it understates the net price every time. The reduced 7% rate applies to a defined list — most foodstuffs, books, newspapers, public transport over short distances — while the standard 19% rate covers everything else.
Getting German VAT right
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Removing VAT means dividing:
gross divided by 1.19 gives net at the standard rate. Subtracting 19% from the gross gives a figure that is too low and will not reconcile.
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The reduced rate is a list, not a judgement:
7% applies to specific categories set out in the statute. Whether a particular product qualifies is a legal question, and the boundaries are famously awkward.
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Kleinunternehmer charge no VAT at all:
businesses under the small-business threshold do not add VAT and cannot reclaim input tax. For them these figures do not apply.
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Invoices must show the tax separately:
net amount, rate, tax amount and gross. A total alone does not meet the requirements for an invoice a customer can reclaim against.
Removing VAT is a division, at either German rate
The [msm_tool slug="mehrwertsteuer-rechner"] works at Germany's standard 19% rate, its reduced 7% rate, or any rate entered directly, and the same asymmetry applies at all three: adding VAT to a net price multiplies, while stripping it back out of a gross price divides rather than subtracts. Dividing a gross price by 1.19 recovers the net at the standard rate; subtracting 19% from the gross instead produces a figure that is too low and will not reconcile against the original net amount.
On a gross price of 119, subtracting 19% gives the wrong number
The correct net there is 100 and the VAT is 19. Subtracting 19% from 119 instead gives 96.39, because that percentage is being taken from a base larger than the one the tax was originally calculated against — a mismatch that is the single most common source of VAT arithmetic errors.
The reduced rate is a defined list, not a judgement call
The 7% reduced rate applies to specific categories set out in the statute — most foodstuffs, books, newspapers, short-distance public transport — while the standard 19% rate covers everything outside that list. Whether a particular product genuinely qualifies for the reduced rate is a legal question with famously awkward boundaries, not something the arithmetic itself can settle.
Kleinunternehmer charge no VAT at all
A business trading under the small-business threshold set out in §19 UStG does not add VAT to its invoices and cannot reclaim VAT on what it buys, so for a business in that position the net and gross figures are identical and this calculation simply does not apply.
An invoice must itemise, not just total
A proper invoice states the net amount, the rate applied, the tax amount and the gross total as separate figures — a single combined number does not satisfy what is required for a customer to reclaim the input tax on their own return.
Correct arithmetic, not tax advice
The calculation itself is reliable, but whether a specific supply carries the standard rate, the reduced rate or an exemption entirely is a legal determination the tool cannot make on its own. For an actual VAT return, that determination is exactly the part that matters most, and a Steuerberater is the appropriate source for it.