New meal and accommodation allowances 2025

The Federal Ministry of Finance (BMF) has published new meal and accommodation allowances for business-related foreign travel for the calendar year 2025. These allowances also apply in the context of dual household management abroad and are relevant for both employees and employers for tax purposes.

Meal allowances

• Employees can claim the meal allowances as income-related expenses, provided they are not reimbursed tax-free by the employer.
• It is not permissible to deduct the actual meal costs instead – only the allowance applies.
• Employers may reimburse the allowances tax-free.

Accommodation allowances

• The accommodation allowances cannot be deducted as income-related expenses.
• However, they can be reimbursed tax-free by the employer – even if the employee incurred no or lower accommodation costs (e.g. when staying with friends).
• If the actual accommodation costs are higher than the allowance, the difference can be claimed as income-related expenses with appropriate proof.

Updated allowances from 2025

The BMF letter dated 23 October 2024 adjusted the allowances for additional meal expenses and accommodation costs for numerous countries. The changes apply from 01.01.2025.

You can find the complete BMF letter with all country-specific allowances here: BMF letter dated 23.10.2024

New allowances apply from 2025 for the following countries:

Afghanistan, Equatorial Guinea, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Barbados, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Costa Rica, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Djibouti, El Salvador, Fiji, Finland, Georgia, Ghana, Guinea, India, Indonesia, Iraq, Ireland, Iceland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Cameroon, Canada, Kenya, Colombia, Cuba, Lebanon, Madagascar, Malaysia, Mali, Morocco, Mauritius, Mexico, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Mozambique, New Zealand, Nigeria, North Macedonia, Norway, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Romania, Sweden, Switzerland, Serbia, Sierra Leone, Slovakia, Spain, Sri Lanka, South Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Trinidad and Tobago, Chad, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, Ukraine, Hungary, Uruguay, USA, Vatican City, Venezuela, Central African Republic, Cyprus.

Note

The application of the allowances requires compliance with the minimum absence times for off-site work. The meal allowances only apply for absences of more than 8 hours or for multi-day trips.