How much does a virtual office cost in Germany?

What does a virtual office cost per month, on day one and in the first year?

The monthly price is the figure every provider advertises, but it is rarely what decides your budget. The table puts three numbers side by side: the monthly fee, the cash you need on day one and the cost of the first year.

Each provider is priced on the shortest term of its tier that can be used for a Handelsregister entry. Day one is the first payment, including any months paid in advance, plus any setup fee and deposit. The first year is twelve months at that price, plus setup and scanning at five letters a month; refundable deposits are left out of it. All amounts exclude VAT. The table is sorted by cash on day one.

Where a provider’s price varies by address, the day-one and first-year figures use one address: Olea at Zehdenicker Straße in Berlin, Clevver in Berlin, Hamburg or Munich, Office Club and CONTORA at their entry addresses, Satellite Office in Berlin and ecos in Munich. Regus sells no virtual office plan that can be used for a German company registration; that route needs a private office, priced individually. For how these providers score on registration, mail, flexibility and coverage, see the best virtual office in Germany.

What decides the price? Where the address is

Location moves the price more than anything else. The two lowest first-year costs in the table belong to single addresses in small towns: Dahn in Rhineland-Palatinate and Kamp-Lintfort in North Rhine-Westphalia. In the big cities you pay first for the city, then for the district and then for the building.

Olea’s own prices show this, because every Olea address includes the same core service and only the location changes the price. In Berlin it is €69/month at Zehdenicker Straße by Rosenthaler Platz, €149 at Potsdamer Platz and €169 at Pariser Platz by the Brandenburg Gate. In Munich it is €99 at Erika-Mann-Straße and €299 on Maximilianstraße, opposite the Bavarian State Opera; in Frankfurt’s banking district, €199 to €269 in the towers.

So compare like with like: addresses in the city and district you want, then the fees on top.

What else adds to the cost?

Monthly fee. The fee for the address itself, priced per address rather than per city. In this comparison it runs from €39.99 to €199/month on the shortest term, and up to €350 at the most expensive centres.

Setup fee. A one-off charge at the start. Most providers here charge none; Office Club charges €49. Satellite Office quotes €99 on enquiry.

Deposit. A refundable sum held for the length of the contract. Clevver, CONTORA and Satellite Office ask for three months’ fees and ecos usually for three gross monthly fees. You get it back at the end, but you need it on day one, and it is tied up for as long as you stay.

Prepaid months and minimum term. A minimum term commits you to paying for that many months; a prepaid term makes you pay them up front. Clevver’s shortest term is three months paid in advance, Office Club’s is three months paid monthly and Smarvo’s is twelve months paid monthly. Longer terms lower the monthly price – Clevver Berlin is €59.95 on twelve months against €79.95 on three – but raise what you are committed to.

Mail scanning and forwarding. The difference between seeing your post wherever you are and collecting it in person. Some providers include scanning in the price (YourGermanAddress, Smarvo, Teeberg, Clevver, Olea up to five letters a month); others charge for it separately, from €0.50 a letter at ecos to €79/month for CONTORA’s mail-handling package. Forwarding the originals is almost always charged on top, plus postage.

Workspace. Meeting rooms, desks and private offices. Office Club includes one flex-desk day and four meeting-room hours a month in its price, which is part of why it costs more. Most other providers, Olea included, let you book workspace when you need it and charge only when you book.

VAT. Every price in this guide excludes VAT, as providers’ own price lists do. German VAT is 19% (§ 12 Abs. 1 UStG). A VAT-registered business deducts it as input tax (Vorsteuerabzug); a small business under the Kleinunternehmer rule cannot, so for it the 19% is a real cost.

Why are some virtual offices so much cheaper?

Because the cheapest tiers are correspondence addresses, not addresses you can register a company at. Six of the ten providers compared here sell a cheaper tier that cannot be used for a Handelsregister entry:

These tiers give you an address for letters, invoices and sometimes your Impressum, but not one where a GmbH or UG can be registered. Regus says so plainly: its “Virtual Office plans … cannot be used for a registered business address in Germany” (Regus rules).

So compare the registration-valid price if you are forming a company or moving one. A €9 address is not a cheaper version of a €59 one; it is a different product. For what makes an address valid for the register, see what a ladungsfähige Anschrift is.

What does a virtual office cost in Berlin, Munich, Hamburg and Frankfurt?

These are the lowest-priced registration-valid addresses in each city, from our city guides, with what each needs at the start.

Olea also has addresses in Cologne (€219), Düsseldorf (€179), Hanover (€159), Potsdam (€179) and Stuttgart (€149–€239). For every address and local option, see the guides to Berlin, Munich, Hamburg and Frankfurt.

What does the first year cost? Two worked examples

The monthly fee is the number providers advertise, but it isn’t what you pay. Two other numbers decide your budget: the cash you need on day one, and the total for the first year once setup fees and scanning are added. And because location sets the base price, those numbers only mean something when you compare addresses of the same kind – a central address with a central one, a landmark with a landmark.

Say you are forming a UG in Berlin, want an address you can use for the Handelsregister, receive about five letters a month and want to be free to leave after a year.

A central address in Mitte

A landmark address

At a landmark address the fees on top matter more than the monthly price. Satellite Office quotes a €99 setup fee, a deposit of three months’ fees and €39/month for scanning on enquiry, so it needs €815 on day one. At Pariser Platz, Olea’s €169 includes the digital mailbox with five scans a month, with no setup fee or deposit, so the first month is all you pay to start.

What this means for your budget. In both pairs the monthly fees are within €11 of each other, but the cash needed on day one is about five to seven times as high and the first year by €131.40 to €687. The extras – prepaid months, deposits, setup fees and paid scanning – are where virtual offices really differ in cost, so price the whole first year before you choose. A landmark address doesn’t have to come with them: with no setup fee or deposit and scanning included, what you pay extra for Pariser Platz is the address itself.

What Olea costs

Olea’s 21 addresses in nine cities cost €69 to €299/month, depending on the address: from practical addresses such as Zehdenicker Straße in Berlin Mitte to landmark buildings such as Pariser Platz at the Brandenburg Gate and the TaunusTurm in Frankfurt. Every address is in a staffed business centre or coworking space and can be used for your Handelsregister entry and Impressum.

• No setup fee, deposit or minimum term. On monthly billing, the first month’s fee is all you pay to start.
• Annual billing is 15% cheaper, billed for the year: €59/month at Zehdenicker Straße, so €708 for the year instead of €828.
• Your post, wherever you are. Every address includes unlimited mail receipt and a digital mailbox with envelope preview, five scans a month included, then €0.79 a letter. Any scanned letter can be forwarded for €1 plus postage. At most addresses you can choose free pickup or scheduled forwarding from €10/month instead.
• Workspace when you need it. Meeting rooms and private offices can be booked at every address, and desks at most. Workspace is booked and paid for when you need it, not included in the monthly price.

See all locations and prices.

FAQs

• Is VAT added to virtual office prices in Germany?

  Yes, on almost every price you see. Providers quote virtual office prices net, and 19% German VAT applies on top. A VAT-registered business deducts it as input tax, so in the end it costs nothing; a Kleinunternehmer cannot, so for them a €69 fee costs €82.11.

• Are there hidden fees with a virtual office?

  Rarely hidden, but often left out of the headline price. The ones to add up are a setup fee (€49 at Office Club), a deposit (three months’ fees at Clevver and CONTORA), separate scanning charges (from €0.50 a letter at ecos to €79/month at CONTORA), forwarding plus postage and, at some local providers, an identity-check fee. Some quote them only on enquiry: Satellite Office’s €99 setup fee, deposit and €39/month scanning aren’t on its price pages. Olea charges no setup fee or deposit, mail receipt is unlimited and five scans a month are included.

• Does the location of a virtual office matter for a GmbH?

  For the register, no – any address that can be used for the Handelsregister will do. But the address appears in your register entry, Impressum and invoices, so it is where clients, banks and partners place your company, and where you meet them if you book a room. That is why a central address in the city you work in costs more than a small-town one. Every Olea address is in a staffed business centre or coworking space in one of nine cities, from €69/month in Berlin Mitte.

• Do you have to pay a deposit for a virtual office?

  Not with every provider. Clevver, CONTORA and Satellite Office take a deposit of three months’ fees and ecos usually three gross monthly fees; Olea, YourGermanAddress and Smarvo take none. A deposit is refunded when the contract ends, but you fund it on day one – €239.85 at Clevver in Berlin, €507 at CONTORA. With Olea there is no deposit or setup fee, so on monthly billing the first month is all you pay to start.

• How much is a registration-valid address in Berlin or Munich?

  It depends on the district and the building. In Berlin, Olea’s addresses cost €69/month by Rosenthaler Platz in Mitte, €95 on Torstraße, €149 at Potsdamer Platz, €169 at the Brandenburg Gate and €219 on the Kurfürstendamm. In Munich, Olea’s three Maxvorstadt addresses cost €99 to €199 and Maximilianstraße, opposite the Bavarian State Opera, €299. With Olea the first month is all you pay to start; for other providers in each city, see the city table above.