All 27 EU member states + Northern Ireland
Each VAT identification number starts with a two-letter ISO country code (with one exception: Greece uses EL instead of GR), followed by a national identifier. The national portion varies by country — some are strictly numeric, others include check letters, and a few (like the Netherlands) embed fixed characters.
The table below lists every member state, the ISO code used in VIES, the structural rule, the total number of characters after the country code, and a realistic example.
| Country | Code | Format | Length | Example |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Austria | AT | U + 8 digits | 9 | ATU12345678 |
| Belgium | BE | 10 digits (leading 0) | 10 | BE0123456789 |
| Bulgaria | BG | 9 or 10 digits | 9–10 | BG123456789 |
| Croatia | HR | 11 digits | 11 | HR12345678901 |
| Cyprus | CY | 8 digits + 1 letter | 9 | CY12345678X |
| Czech Republic | CZ | 8, 9, or 10 digits | 8–10 | CZ12345678 |
| Denmark | DK | 8 digits | 8 | DK12345678 |
| Estonia | EE | 9 digits | 9 | EE123456789 |
| Finland | FI | 8 digits | 8 | FI12345678 |
| France | FR | 2 chars (letters or digits) + 9 digits | 11 | FRXX123456789 |
| Germany | DE | 9 digits | 9 | DE123456789 |
| Greece | EL | 9 digits | 9 | EL123456789 |
| Hungary | HU | 8 digits | 8 | HU12345678 |
| Ireland | IE | 7 digits + 1 or 2 letters | 8–9 | IE6388047V |
| Italy | IT | 11 digits | 11 | IT12345678901 |
| Latvia | LV | 11 digits | 11 | LV12345678901 |
| Lithuania | LT | 9 or 12 digits | 9 / 12 | LT123456789 |
| Luxembourg | LU | 8 digits | 8 | LU12345678 |
| Malta | MT | 8 digits | 8 | MT12345678 |
| Netherlands | NL | 9 digits + B + 2 digits | 12 | NL123456789B01 |
| Poland | PL | 10 digits | 10 | PL1234567890 |
| Portugal | PT | 9 digits | 9 | PT123456789 |
| Romania | RO | 2–10 digits | 2–10 | RO123456789 |
| Slovakia | SK | 10 digits | 10 | SK1234567890 |
| Slovenia | SI | 8 digits | 8 | SI12345678 |
| Spain | ES | 1 letter + 7 digits + 1 letter (or 9 digits) | 9 | ESX12345678 |
| Sweden | SE | 12 digits (ends in 01) | 12 | SE123456789001 |
| Northern Ireland | XI | 9 digits (post-Brexit goods trade) | 9 | XI123456789 |
Important notes
- Greece uses
EL, notGR. This is a historical quirk carried over into VIES. - Northern Ireland (
XI) is the only non-EU code accepted by VIES, introduced after Brexit under the Northern Ireland Protocol for goods-trade B2B invoicing. - Great Britain (
GB) numbers are not in VIES since 1 January 2021. Use HMRC's own checker for GB VAT. - Format checks are not validity checks. A number can match the format exactly and still be invalid. Always run it through the checker to confirm against VIES.
Ready to validate a number?
Head back to the VAT number checker and query any of these against the live VIES database.