CSRD in Germany: Implementation Status, Scope and Filing Requirements

If you are looking for the German CSRD statute, there isn't one yet.

As of September 2026 Germany has not transposed the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive. There is a government bill before the Bundestag, a coalition amendment folding in the EU Omnibus, and a great deal of voluntary ESRS reporting already happening — but no German statutory CSRD reporting obligation in force. What binds German companies today is still the older CSR Directive implementation in the HGB, not the CSRD.

That gap is the single most important fact for planning, and it has some genuinely German consequences. This guide sets out where the legislation stands, what the draft will require when it lands, and what German companies should be doing in the meantime.

Last reviewed: 8 September 2026. German implementation is actively moving and is being rewritten to reflect the EU Omnibus directive. Verify the current position before relying on anything here for a filing decision.

Where the German legislation actually stands

Transposition is being done through a single Act amending the HGB, the EGHGB, the WPO and a stack of sector statutes — the CSRD-Umsetzungsgesetz.

The path has been messy. An earlier government draft from the previous Bundestag (BT-Drs. 20/12787) died under the principle of Diskontinuität when the Ampel coalition collapsed. The BMJ restarted the file: a Referentenentwurf on 10 July 2025, then a Regierungsentwurf on 3 September 2025 (BT-Drs. 21/1857), already incorporating the Stop-the-Clock Directive (EU) 2025/794.

Then the Omnibus substantive directive landed. On 31 March 2026 the CDU/CSU and SPD tabled a joint Änderungsantrag (Ausschussdrucksache 21(6)73) rewriting the draft to follow Directive (EU) 2026/470. The Rechtsausschuss held a public hearing on 13 April 2026. At the time of writing the bill has not completed second and third reading, has not been signed by the Bundespräsident, and has not been published in the Bundesgesetzblatt. There is no confirmed entry-into-force date.

The EU transposition deadline was 6 July 2024 and was missed. Germany, like several other member states, has been under Commission infringement pressure for the delay. Treat any date you see quoted for the UmsG as a forecast until BGBl publication appears.

A drafting detail that matters

The reporting obligation is being written into §§ 289b ff. and 315b ff. HGB, replacing the existing nichtfinanzielle Erklärung with a Nachhaltigkeitsbericht inside the (Konzern-)Lagebericht. The transitional architecture sits in the EGHGB (notably the Art. 96 family of provisions), which is where the Omnibus carve-outs and first-application dates actually live.

The practical consequence: when the law lands, your obligations will be in the HGB text you already know how to read — but the when and who will be decided by the EGHGB transition articles, not by the headline HGB sections alone.

Who is in scope after the Omnibus

The German scoping is being rewritten to follow Directive (EU) 2026/470, the substantive Omnibus directive, published in the Official Journal on 26 February 2026 and in force since 18 March 2026. Member states have until 19 March 2027 to transpose it. For the EU-level detail, see our Omnibus guide.

Under that directive, for financial years beginning on or after 1 January 2027, an undertaking is in scope only if it exceeds both:

• more than 1,000 employees on average during the financial year, and
• more than €450 million net turnover,

measured at individual or group level. Listed SMEs come out of mandatory scope altogether. Capital-market orientation drops out of the post-2027 test: size alone decides.

Until then, the Änderungsantrag keeps a narrower Wave 1 cohort in the picture for financial years beginning between 1 January 2024 and 31 December 2026: large public-interest entities (and parents of large groups) exceeding 500 employees. That is the old first-wave definition — and it only becomes a German CSRD duty once the UmsG is in force.

The Wave 1 carve-out Germany intends to use

Germany is taking the member-state option to relieve original first-wave entities that fall below the new 1,000-employee and €450 million thresholds from CSRD reporting for financial years 2025 and 2026. In the Änderungsantrag that relief is drafted as a cumulative test (Art. 96 Abs. 8 EGHGB-E). If you are a listed company, bank or insurer with 501–1,000 employees, or with turnover below €450 million, treat yourself as likely out of mandatory CSRD for those two years — once the law exists. Until then, CSR-RUG still applies.

The Rückwirkungsverbot problem

Here is where the German situation gets constitutionally awkward. The draft applies the new HGB sustainability-reporting rules to financial years beginning after 31 December 2024. If the Act is enacted late in 2026, that would pull FY2025 — already closed for calendar-year companies — under a statute that did not exist when the year was being closed.

German commentary, including from industry associations at the April 2026 hearing, has flagged this as a Rückwirkungsverbot problem under Article 20 of the Basic Law. The IDW has long taken the view that a genuine retroactive first application to a closed financial year is constitutionally inadmissible. Watch the Beschlussempfehlung of the Rechtsausschuss carefully on this point: the first-application date may still move.

What German Wave 1 companies actually did for FY2024

Because the UmsG was not in force, FY2024 remained governed by the CSR-RUG rules in §§ 289b ff. / 315b ff. HGB. There was no German duty to prepare an ESRS sustainability statement, and no duty to obtain limited assurance on one.

What companies could do — and many did — was use the ESRS as a recognised framework under § 289d HGB. The IDW's November and December 2024 Q&As set out three options for the nichtfinanzielle Erklärung:

1. Full application of ESRS Set 1 as the framework
2. Partial application of ESRS, with the applied standards clearly disclosed
3. No ESRS, meeting only the existing HGB content requirements (plus Taxonomy Art. 8 where applicable)

A May 2025 DRSC / Deloitte review of listed FY2024 reporters found that a clear majority of published reports were prepared with full or substantial ESRS observance, often as an identifiable section of the Lagebericht — even though that was voluntary. Smaller SDAX names were more likely to stay on pure CSR-RUG.

Assurance under current law is thin. The statutory auditor's duty on the nichtfinanzielle Erklärung is essentially the formal check under § 317 Abs. 2 HGB. Substantive limited assurance under ISAE 3000 (Revised) happens only where the company commissions it voluntarily.

Where the report sits, and where it is filed

Under the draft, the sustainability statement sits inside the (Konzern-)Lagebericht, as an identifiable separate section — not as a standalone Nachhaltigkeitsbericht outside it. The old option of a separate non-financial report beside the management report goes away.

• Filed with the Unternehmensregister, electronically via the Publikationsplattform operated by Bundesanzeiger Verlag, under the existing § 325 HGB disclosure architecture (DiRUG shifted filings off the Bundesanzeiger for financial years beginning after 31 December 2021).
• Format: the draft originally pushed ESEF/XHTML preparation of the management report with digital tagging of the sustainability information. The Omnibus opened a permanent Offenlegungslösung (disclosure solution) member-state option — prepare the authoritative report normally, convert to the electronic format for publication. The Änderungsantrag moves Germany onto that disclosure solution from 1 January 2027. Our XBRL and digital tagging guide covers the mechanics; expect the German technical detail to firm up with the adopted law and any BMJ ordinance.

Listed issuers have an additional layer: BaFin's existing financial-reporting enforcement over the Lagebericht of capital-market-oriented companies will extend to the sustainability section once it is part of that report.

Language: German is required

This is a common question from groups that report in English at parent level, and the German answer is stricter than in several neighbouring member states.

Under § 325 Abs. 1 HGB, the annual financial statements, Lagebericht and related documents must be disclosed to the Unternehmensregister in German. An English translation may be filed as a supplement; it does not discharge the German-language obligation.

The CSRD-Umsetzungsgesetz drafts do not carve the sustainability section out of that rule. Plan on a German Nachhaltigkeitsbericht inside the Lagebericht. English-only filing is not available the way it is, for example, in the Netherlands.

Assurance: Wirtschaftsprüfer only

Three decisions in the draft are worth knowing, because Germany has landed differently from some of its neighbours on the provider question.

Limited assurance, and it stays there. The step-up to reasonable assurance has been dropped by the Omnibus directive. The Commission is to adopt harmonised limited assurance standards by 1 July 2027. Our assurance guide covers what limited assurance actually involves.

Only Wirtschaftsprüfer may sign. The CSRD lets member states open sustainability assurance to independent assurance service providers. The German drafts do not take that option. The explanatory memorandum's reasoning is familiar: there is currently no equivalent German regime of training, aptitude testing, quality assurance, sanctions, liability and supervision for environmental verifiers or other providers that would meet the "equivalent requirements" test in the Accounting Directive. So statutory sustainability assurance stays with Wirtschaftsprüfer and Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaften registered as Nachhaltigkeitsprüfer in the WPK Berufsregister.

But it need not be your Abschlussprüfer. The draft allows a different Wirtschaftsprüfer or WPG to perform the sustainability assurance than the one auditing the financial statements. That is a real procurement choice.

Two further mechanics once the law is in force. Existing Wirtschaftsprüfer get a grandfathering path into the Nachhaltigkeitsprüfer register (with a catch-up CPD obligation); newly qualified WPs will need the additional sustainability module under the amended WPO. And there is a transitional default: if the Hauptversammlung was convened before the UmsG entered into force and no sustainability auditor was appointed, the statutory auditor is deemed appointed for the sustainability engagement for early periods — though the Änderungsantrag's cut-off wording on this point still looked like a drafting slip as of the April 2026 hearing, so verify the final text.

Until the UmsG is in force, voluntary ESRS assurance continues under ISAE 3000 (Revised) and the relevant IDW practice statements. There is no German Nachhaltigkeitsprüfer register entry to obtain yet, because the legal basis for it does not exist.

BaFin's role — and the penalty architecture

BaFin is the administrative authority for Ordnungswidrigkeiten under § 334 HGB where the company is capital-market-oriented within the meaning of § 264d HGB. For other companies, the ordinary administrative authorities handle HGB fines. Once sustainability content sits inside the Lagebericht, BaFin's existing enforcement over issuer reporting reaches it.

The draft does not invent a CSRD-specific fine schedule. It extends the existing HGB sanction architecture:

• § 334 HGB Ordnungswidrigkeiten for defective preparation. For ordinary companies, Geldbußen generally cap at €50,000 (higher bands apply to certain serious cases). For capital-market-oriented companies the individual-level cap rises to the higher of €2 million or twice the economic benefit; where the fine is imposed on the company under § 30 OWiG, the cap is the highest of €10 million, 5% of annual turnover, or twice the benefit.
• § 335 HGB Ordnungsgeld for failure to disclose. Ordinary caps remain modest (up to €25,000); capital-market-oriented companies again face the €10 million / 5% turnover / twice-benefit ceiling.
• Criminal provisions in §§ 331–333 HGB for seriously false presentation remain available in principle, though they are reserved for grave cases.

If you are used to the penalty regimes across member states, the German headline numbers for listed issuers are among the higher ones in the EU — but they ride on the existing HGB/OWiG machinery, not on a bespoke CSRD fine.

What German companies should do now

1. Re-test whether you will still be in scope. Run the 1,000-employee and €450 million turnover test at group level for financial years beginning on or after 1 January 2027. Separately, check whether the Wave 1 carve-out for FY2025 and FY2026 will take you out before then.
2. If you have been reporting under ESRS voluntarily, keep the discipline — and label it clearly. Full or partial ESRS used as a § 289d framework still has to satisfy the underlying CSR-RUG content duties. Say so in the report. Do not imply a statutory CSRD assurance that German law cannot yet require.
3. Do not treat "no UmsG yet" as "no obligation". The nichtfinanzielle Erklärung is still mandatory for in-scope CSR-RUG companies, Taxonomy Article 8 still applies, and value-chain data requests from in-scope customers in other member states do not wait for Berlin. Your double materiality assessment takes months regardless of when the statute lands.
4. Decide deliberately who does your assurance. Germany will permit a different Wirtschaftsprüfer from your Abschlussprüfer. That is a choice worth making on the merits, not by default.
5. Watch the Rechtsausschuss Beschlussempfehlung for the first-application date and the Rückwirkung language, and 19 March 2027 as the outside date for Omnibus transposition.

Frequently asked questions

Is the CSRD law in Germany yet? No. As of September 2026 the CSRD-Umsetzungsgesetz (BT-Drs. 21/1857, as amended by the March 2026 Änderungsantrag) is still before the Bundestag and has not been published in the Bundesgesetzblatt.

Does my German company still have to report? Yes, if you are in scope of the existing CSR-RUG rules — you still owe a nichtfinanzielle Erklärung. A full CSRD / ESRS sustainability statement is not yet a German statutory duty. From financial years beginning on or after 1 January 2027, mandatory CSRD scope is expected to be limited to undertakings exceeding both 1,000 employees and €450 million net turnover.

Can we file our sustainability statement in English? Not as the authoritative filing. § 325 HGB requires German-language disclosure to the Unternehmensregister. An English version may accompany it; it does not replace it.

Do we need our Abschlussprüfer to give the sustainability assurance? No. Once the UmsG is in force, a different Wirtschaftsprüfer or WPG may perform the sustainability assurance, though independent assurance service providers are not being admitted. Until then, any substantive assurance is voluntary.

We reported voluntarily under ESRS for FY2024. Are we exposed to retroactive non-compliance? Not under current law — FY2024 closed under CSR-RUG. The open question is FY2025 if the UmsG is enacted with a first-application date that reaches already-closed years. That is precisely the Rückwirkungsverbot debate still live in the parliamentary process.

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Getting this right in a jurisdiction where the statute is still moving is exactly the kind of problem where local experience pays for itself. Browse the CSRD and sustainability consultants listed in Germany, or read our guide on how to hire a CSRD consultant.