germany vgv planungswettbewerb hoai architektenkammer cross-border bidding

Architecture tenders in Germany: VgV procedures, competitions and how a foreign firm bids

TenderDesk · 28 Oct 2026 · 22 min read

Germany is Europe's largest market for public design commissions and one of the hardest to read from outside. This guide explains the VgV negotiated procedure, the RPW competition, the 2026 thresholds and direct-award limits, the HOAI fee framework, the title and registration rules, and how a foreign practice prepares a credible application.

Germany publishes more public design commissions than any other European country, and foreign practices win almost none of them. A 2023 survey by the Federal Chamber of Architects found that only 4 percent of EU-wide planning procedures drew a single application from abroad; three quarters of authorities had never received one. The reasons are not legal. Germany admits any architect entitled to practise in another member state, bids are assessed on quality more than price, and the law was rewritten in July 2026 to make applications lighter. The reasons are practical: a two-stage negotiated procedure with its own vocabulary, selection criteria built around German references, a competition culture with rules of its own, sixteen states with different small-contract limits, and documents that are in German only.

This guide explains how the system works as it stands in October 2026, after the Vergabebeschleunigungsgesetz came into force on 1 July 2026, and what a practice from France, Portugal, the Netherlands or the UK needs in place before it applies. Figures and paragraph numbers are those in force; the sources at the end let you check them.

Key points

Above the EU thresholds, architecture and engineering services are governed by sections 73 to 80 of the Vergabeverordnung (VgV). The standard procedure is the Verhandlungsverfahren mit Teilnahmewettbewerb: a public call for applications, a shortlist of three to five firms, then negotiation on fee and approach.
The thresholds for 2026 and 2027 are €216,000 for services bought by regional and local authorities, €140,000 for federal ministries, and €5,404,000 for works, all net of VAT. Since August 2023 the fees of all disciplines on one project are added together to test the threshold, which pushes most building projects above it.
Below the thresholds each state sets its own limits. Direct awards of planning services are possible up to €100,000 in Bavaria, Baden-Württemberg and Hesse, €50,000 at federal level since July 2026, and less in some other states.
Award is a Leistungswettbewerb, a competition on quality: the fee may count, and in Berlin it typically carries 20 to 50 percent of the marks, but a pure price award is unlawful. The HOAI fee scale is no longer binding; it remains the reference every client and bidder uses.
The Planungswettbewerb under the RPW 2013 rules is the classic route to a building commission: anonymous, judged by a jury with a majority of architects, prize money that must equal at least the preliminary-design fee, and an obligation to commission one of the prize-winners.
Any architect entitled to the title in another EU or EEA state may apply. To use the title "Architekt" in Germany and to sign building applications you need an entry in a state chamber's list or, for temporary work, a notification as a visiting professional, and the degree must be one the EU directive recognises.
Submissions are in German. There is no legal rule that says so; the tender documents do, and almost all of them do.
References are the selection battlefield: the law allows three years but lets the authority accept older ones, and since July 2026 requires criteria that give small offices and newcomers a fair chance. Ask, in writing, before the deadline.
The standstill before contract is 10 calendar days after electronic notification. A complaint (Rüge) must be raised within 10 days of noticing the breach; review is by the Vergabekammer, which decides in about five weeks.
Berlin's chamber counted 200 EU-wide VgV procedures against 8 registered competitions in 2025. The negotiated procedure, not the competition, is where the volume is.

The legal map

German procurement law has two floors. Above the EU thresholds, Part 4 of the Act against Restraints of Competition (GWB) and the VgV apply, and the VgV's sixth section (sections 73 to 80) is a special regime for Architekten- und Ingenieurleistungen. Below the thresholds, the federal government and most states apply the Unterschwellenvergabeordnung (UVgO), whose section 50 says that freelance services are "in principle to be awarded in competition" with as much competition as the nature of the commission allows, and leaves the procedure to the authority. On top of both sit sixteen state procurement laws, mostly about minimum wages and collective agreements (Tariftreue), and the state budget rules that set the small-contract limits.

Three changes since 2023 matter more than anything else in this section. First, the Planerprivileg is gone: until August 2023 only "similar" planning services on a project were added together to test the threshold, so an architect's fee and a structural engineer's fee were counted separately. The eForms amendment of 2023 deleted that sentence, so now every planning lot of one project is aggregated, and a school with €1.5 million of design fees across five disciplines is an EU-wide procurement for each of them. Second, the thresholds fell on 1 January 2026, to €216,000 for sub-central services, €140,000 for central government and €5,404,000 for works, under the Commission's delegated regulations of October 2025. Third, the Vergabebeschleunigungsgesetz of 12 May 2026, in force 1 July 2026, raised the federal direct-award limit to €50,000, made self-declarations the default form of evidence with certificates demanded only from bidders still in contention, eased proof requirements for firms less than eight years old, re-worded the suitability rule for architects, removed the suspensive effect of appeals against Vergabekammer decisions, and added digital sovereignty and climate criteria. Procedures started before 1 July 2026 finish under the old rules.

A further reform is pending: a new UVgO, published as a draft in July 2026, would cut the below-threshold rules from 54 to 24 paragraphs, set a default direct-award limit of €50,000 unless a state deviates, and allow a negotiated award without a call for applications up to €100,000. It has not been adopted. The HOAI, the fee ordinance, has been under discussion for a revision since 2024; as of October 2026 no draft has been published and the ministry has said it is not a priority.

Thresholds, aggregation and the direct-award limits

The value of a planning contract is estimated on the day the notice is sent, net of VAT, over all phases, and includes the follow-on commission, prizes and participant payments when a competition precedes it. Lots under €80,000 may be exempted from the EU regime if together they are no more than 20 percent of the total.

Below the thresholds the rules differ by state, and the limits rose sharply in 2025 and 2026. At federal level the direct-award limit went from €1,000 to €15,000 in 2025 and to €50,000 net on 1 July 2026, with an informal price comparison and rotation of suppliers. Bavaria allows municipalities to award freelance services directly up to €100,000 net and to run a negotiated award without a call for applications up to the EU threshold, until the end of 2029. Baden-Württemberg's state bodies may award freelance services directly up to €100,000 and negotiate with at least three firms below €216,000, until September 2027. Hesse's decree of June 2026 sets €100,000 for supplies and services for all authorities including municipalities, valid to 2033, with three quotes above €20,000. North Rhine-Westphalia's state authorities use €50,000 for services since February 2026, and its municipalities have been freed from fixed limits altogether. Berlin raised its supplies-and-services limit to €75,000 in September 2026 and applies a corresponding limit to freelance services. Hamburg still sits at €5,000 for direct awards with a simplified procedure below €100,000, pending a new decree in December 2026.

What this means for a foreign firm: a feasibility study, a competition-brief consultancy or a small extension can be commissioned directly by a Bavarian or Hessian town up to €100,000 without any notice at all. Those commissions are won through relationships, not portals, which is why a local partner matters for the small end of the market. Everything larger goes through a published procedure that TenderDesk reads: EU-wide notices through TED and the federal Datenservice Öffentlicher Einkauf, below-threshold notices through the state platforms.

The negotiated procedure, step by step

Section 74 VgV says architecture and engineering services are "as a rule" awarded through the negotiated procedure with a prior call for competition, or through competitive dialogue. The negotiated procedure is justified because the task includes conceptual solutions that cannot be exhaustively specified in advance, which is section 73's definition of a planning service.

Stage one is the Teilnahmewettbewerb. The authority publishes a contract notice in TED and on its platform, and firms have at least 30 days (15 in justified urgency, five fewer if electronic submission is accepted, which it always is) to submit a Teilnahmeantrag. The application is formal: the self-declarations on exclusion grounds, turnover for up to three years, staff numbers over three years, professional qualifications, insurance, and the references. The authority sets a minimum number and a maximum number of firms it will invite, typically three to five, and selection criteria with points. When more equally qualified firms remain than places, section 75(6) allows a lottery, the Losverfahren, which the chambers recommend because it gives small offices a chance.

Stage two is the Verhandlung. The invited firms receive the full documents and at least 30 days to prepare, often with a presentation of their approach, their team and in many procedures a sketch of their concept, which section 76 allows only in this procedure, in a competition or in competitive dialogue, and section 77 says must be paid for uniformly when it is requested. The negotiation covers the fee, the team and the method; an authority may decide to award on the initial offers without negotiating if the notice reserved that right. The award goes to the most economically advantageous tender under criteria weighted in the notice.

Award is a Leistungswettbewerb, a competition on performance. Section 76 says so in its first sentence and keeps the fee ordinances "unaffected". The federal chambers' recommendation is that price should be subordinate, around 10 percent, and that a fixed fee with competition on quality alone is lawful; the practice is less generous. Berlin's chamber analysed 200 procedures in 2025 and found the fee weighted at 20 to 50 percent in 69 percent of them and above 50 percent in 19 percent, and one procedure in five run as an open procedure with no negotiation at all. A 2026 notice from the town of Lörrach is typical of a good one: fee 25 to 30 percent, three to five invitations per lot, three references, German only.

The HOAI explains the fee conversation. Since the European Court of Justice ruled in 2019 that binding minimum and maximum fees breached the Services Directive, the 2021 HOAI makes fees freely negotiable in text form, with its tables as non-binding orientation and the former minimum rate as the default when nothing is agreed. Every German client and bidder still prices in HOAI terms: the nine Leistungsphasen (service phases) of section 34 for buildings, from Grundlagenermittlung (2 percent) through Entwurfsplanung (15), Genehmigungsplanung (3), Ausführungsplanung (25), Vergabe (10) to Objektüberwachung (32) and Objektbetreuung (2), the Honorarzone that classes the building's difficulty, and the anrechenbare Kosten, the construction cost the fee is calculated on. A foreign bidder who prices a commission as a lump sum without mapping it to phases and a percentage of the HOAI tables will be asked to explain the gap, and the comparison will be made for it.

The Planungswettbewerb

The design competition is the other door, older and more prestigious. Sections 78 to 80 VgV frame it; the Richtlinie für Planungswettbewerbe (RPW 2013) gives the rules, and a competition registered with the state chamber carries a note confirming it complies. Public clients must examine and document for every building, urban design, bridge and landscape project whether to hold a competition.

The forms are the offener Wettbewerb, open to all with a public call; the nichtoffener Wettbewerb, with a selection stage on non-discriminatory qualitative criteria and often a lottery to reach the number of participants, usually twelve to eighteen; and the Einladungswettbewerb for private clients. Entries are anonymous until the jury has decided. The jury has a majority of Fachpreisrichter with the participants' qualification, independent of the organiser. The prize fund must be used in full and is normally at least the fee for the preliminary design under the HOAI; small offices are to be "appropriately involved". The client commits to commission one of the prize-winners, as a rule the winner, unless there is an important reason not to, and the prize is set off against the fee. Section 14(4) no. 8 VgV then allows a negotiated procedure without a new call, to which all prize-winners must be invited. The exhibition of entries with the authors' names follows within a month.

A cheaper relative is the Mehrfachbeauftragung: three to seven offices commissioned and paid to produce a concept, without anonymity and without an obligation to commission further, at a fee the Bavarian chambers put at about 5 percent of the basic HOAI fee for a building. It is common for private and church clients and for small municipal projects.

The numbers show where competitions stand. Bavaria registered 117 competitions in 2019 and 78 in 2022, 45 of them above the EU threshold; Baden-Württemberg 74 in 2023 and 61 in 2024 with about fourteen participants each; Lower Saxony 20 in 2024 with eleven participants each; Berlin 8 in 2025 against 200 EU-wide VgV procedures. A national total of around 300 a year is a fair estimate; no authority publishes one. For a foreign practice the open and non-open competitions are the fairest route into Germany, because anonymity removes the reference problem at the moment that counts, and because a prize is a German reference.

Where tenders and competitions are published

Electronic procurement has been mandatory above the thresholds since 2016 and for federal below-threshold contracts since 2017. Since October 2023 all EU-wide notices go through the Datenservice Öffentlicher Einkauf (oeffentlichevergabe.de), the federal service run by the Beschaffungsamt with Bremen, which forwards them to TED as eForms and publishes them with an open-data interface; TED remains the complete source for everything above the thresholds, which is why the Berlin chamber's own tender monitor imports TED nightly and why TenderDesk reads TED for Germany four times a day. Below-threshold notices appear on the state platforms: vergabe.bayern.de, vergabeplattform.berlin.de, service-bw.de, the Vergabemarktplatz NRW, had.de in Hesse, vergabe.niedersachsen.de, evergabe.sachsen.de and the Hamburg and federal e-Vergabe platforms. Award notices follow within 30 days of award.

Competitions have their own channels: each state chamber of architects publishes the competitions it has registered. TenderDesk's feed includes the EU-wide competition notices, which every public competition above the threshold must publish, and the below-threshold ones as the state sources are added.

Eligibility: title, registration and the building application

The VgV is open. Section 75(1) and (2) say that anyone entitled to bear the professional title under the law of a German state, or entitled "to act correspondingly in the Federal Republic", must be admitted, and that equivalent certificates from other member states must be recognised; legal persons are admitted if they name a responsible professional. No German office, company or bank account is required to apply, and notices ask foreign applicants only for equivalent home-country certificates with a German translation.

The title is another matter. "Architekt" is protected by the sixteen state architects' acts; using it, and submitting building applications as the Entwurfsverfasser, requires entry in the architects' list of the state where you work or, for temporary and occasional services, a notification as an auswärtiger Dienstleister with that state's chamber. For EU and EEA nationals whose degree is listed in Annex V.7 of Directive 2005/36 and who hold the certificate in column 4, recognition is automatic; other degrees go through an individual comparison. The notification costs roughly €150 to €200 per state, needs proof of nationality, of lawful practice at home, of the qualification and of professional liability insurance, with certified German translations, and is decided within three months. Swiss architects are covered by the bilateral agreement; UK architects recognised before 2021 keep their status, while later applications are treated as third-country cases with an assessment by the Central Office for Foreign Education.

The building application is where this becomes practical. Under the state building codes (section 67 of the North Rhine-Westphalian code is typical) only a bauvorlageberechtigter designer may sign a Bauantrag: an architect entitled to the title or a listed engineer, and EU providers who have notified the chamber. A foreign firm that wins a commission through Leistungsphase 4, the Genehmigungsplanung, therefore needs either a registered partner in the team or its own notification. Most foreign winners of German competitions deliver with a German Kontaktarchitekt who carries phases 4 to 8; the German term for that role, and for the arrangement, is understood by every client.

Insurance is checked at application. The state minimum for a chamber member in North Rhine-Westphalia is €1.5 million for personal injury and €250,000 for property and financial loss, twice a year; companies must carry three times the annual maximum. Authorities may demand a higher cover "in a specific appropriate amount" under section 45 VgV, and larger projects ask for €3 million or more; the applicant's insurer confirmation, in German, belongs in the application.

The language rule is set in the documents, not the law: the Lörrach notice, like nearly all others, requires the application, the tender and all correspondence in German and accepts foreign certificates only with a translation. Plan for a German-speaking project lead and a translator for the application; a German partner solves both.

References, turnover and the newcomer rule

Selection is where foreign firms lose. Section 46(3) VgV lets the authority ask for the essential services of "at most the last three years", but adds that older references may be considered to ensure sufficient competition; the Baden-Württemberg chamber advises authorities to allow more than three years and the federal chambers recommend no time limit at all and one or two references at half the project's volume. Section 75(5) says references must be comparable in their planning requirements and that the same building use is "as a rule irrelevant", a sentence worth quoting back when a brief demands three completed schools. Section 45 caps minimum turnover at twice the estimated contract value and lets young firms prove financial standing by other means.

The new section 75(4), in force since 1 July 2026, requires suitability criteria to be proportionate and "to take appropriate account of the particular circumstances of smaller office organisations and newcomers". Berlin's 2025 analysis shows how far practice is from that: 24 percent of procedures demanded four or more references, half demanded the same building use, 56 percent demanded experience with public clients, and 15 percent set turnover above three times the annual fee. Those demands are the ones to challenge. The mechanism is the Bieterfrage, a written question through the platform before the application deadline, asking the authority to confirm that references of comparable planning requirements from other countries and older than three years will be accepted; authorities answer all bidders at once and often soften the criterion. A demand that cannot be justified is a breach visible in the notice, which must be complained about (gerügt) by the application deadline.

Self-declarations carry the application: the Einheitliche Europäische Eigenerklärung (EEE, the ESPD) is accepted as provisional proof under section 48, home-state certificates and sworn statements are accepted, and since July 2026 the certificates themselves are requested only from the bidders still in contention. A Bietergemeinschaft, a group of firms, must be treated like a single bidder, may not be required to take a legal form before award, and names an authorised representative; in a competition every member must meet the professional requirement. Relying on another firm's capacity (Eignungsleihe) needs that firm's commitment and, for professional experience, its performance of the work.

After submission: deadlines, standstill and review

Minimum periods are 30 days for applications, 15 in urgency, 30 for initial offers, 10 by agreement, less five when electronic. Tenders are submitted in text form through the platform; a qualified electronic signature is needed only when the authority says so. Once the award decision is made, the authority informs the unsuccessful bidders and may sign no earlier than 10 calendar days after electronic dispatch (15 by post), under section 134 GWB.

A bidder who sees a breach must raise a Rüge within 10 calendar days of recognising it, and breaches visible in the notice or documents must be raised by the application or tender deadline; if the authority refuses to remedy, the application to the Vergabekammer must follow within 15 days. The chamber decides in five weeks, extendable by two, for a fee of at least €2,500 and normally at most €50,000. Since July 2026 the appeal to the higher regional court no longer suspends the chamber's decision. The federal chambers handled about 130 reviews in 2025; the state chambers many more. The Wettbewerbsregister, the national register of firms excluded for serious misconduct, is consulted for contracts from €50,000.

What the market looks like

The 2024 federal procurement statistics record 199,334 reported awards worth €135 billion, 88 percent below the EU thresholds and 82 percent to small and medium-sized firms; services were €44.5 billion. Planning services are not broken out. The best proxy for the design market is the chambers' own counts: Berlin alone saw 200 EU-wide planning procedures in 2025; the architecture-related CPV codes in TED produce several thousand German notices a year; and competitions run at roughly 300 a year nationally with ten to fifteen participants each. The Federal Chamber's survey found that a quarter of self-employed architects entered at least one competition in 2022, that participation rises from 8 percent of one-person offices to 80 percent of offices with more than 25 staff, and that 92 percent consider the effort and the chances out of balance. A foreign firm competes mostly with German firms that also find the system heavy; the ones that win treat the application as a product and reuse it.

A preparation plan for a foreign practice

First, decide which states. Bavaria, Baden-Württemberg, North Rhine-Westphalia, Hesse and Berlin publish the most planning procedures and competitions; the chamber in each offers competition advice and a list of registered competitions. Second, settle the title: file the notification as a visiting professional in your first target state, or agree a Kontaktarchitekt partnership that covers phases 4 to 8, and get your insurer's confirmation in German at €1.5 million and €3 million. Third, build the German application pack once: the EEE, turnover and staff declarations, insurance, the qualification certificates with certified translations, and five reference sheets in the HOAI vocabulary (Leistungsphasen delivered, Honorarzone, anrechenbare Kosten, BGF, completion year, client contact), each on one page with two images. Fourth, set alerts for CPV 71200000, 71221000 and 71240000 in your states, and for the competition notices, and read the Lörrach-type notices to learn the criteria before you answer one. Fifth, enter one open or non-open competition in your first year; a prize is a German reference and the anonymous stage is the one place where your portfolio counts more than your address. Sixth, ask the Bieterfrage on every brief whose references or turnover look closed to you, by the deadline and in writing; the law since July 2026 is on your side.

Checklist

Target states chosen and their chambers' competition lists bookmarked
Visiting-professional notification filed in the first state, or a Kontaktarchitekt agreement for phases 4 to 8
Professional liability confirmation in German at the levels briefs ask (€1.5m personal injury minimum; €3m for larger projects)
EEE and self-declarations prepared; certificates ready with certified German translations
Five reference sheets in HOAI terms (Leistungsphasen, Honorarzone, anrechenbare Kosten, BGF, year, client contact)
Fee model mapped to HOAI phases and tables for every offer
German-speaking project lead named; translator for applications
Alerts set for the architecture CPV codes and competition notices in the target states
Bieterfrage template ready for reference-age, building-use and turnover demands
Rüge deadlines (10 days; application deadline for visible breaches) and the 10-day standstill noted for every procedure

Frequently asked questions

Can a foreign practice apply for a German public architecture commission without a German office?

Yes. Section 75 VgV admits anyone entitled to practise as an architect in another EU or EEA state, and equivalent certificates must be recognised. No German company, office or bank account is needed to apply or to be awarded. To use the title "Architekt" in Germany and to sign the building application you need a chamber entry or a visiting-professional notification, or a registered German partner in the team.

What are the German thresholds for architecture services in 2026?

€216,000 net for services bought by states, municipalities and most public bodies, €140,000 for federal ministries, and €5,404,000 for works, from 1 January 2026 to 31 December 2027. The fees of all planning disciplines on one project are added together, so most building projects with a total design fee above €216,000 are EU-wide procedures for every discipline.

Is the HOAI still binding?

No. Since 1 January 2021 fees are freely negotiable in text form; the HOAI tables are non-binding orientation and the former minimum rate applies only when nothing was agreed. In practice every German client and competitor still prices in HOAI phases, zones and percentages, so an offer should be mapped to them.

How much does the fee count in the award?

The law requires a competition on quality (Leistungswettbewerb) and forbids a pure price award. The chambers recommend about 10 percent for the fee; Berlin's 2025 analysis found 20 to 50 percent in two thirds of procedures. The weighting is in the notice.

Must I submit in German?

Almost always. No statute requires it, but the tender documents do, and foreign certificates are accepted only with a German translation, certified where the authority asks.

What is the difference between a VgV procedure and a Planungswettbewerb?

The VgV negotiated procedure selects a shortlist on references and capacity and awards on a weighted mix of approach, team and fee; it produces most commissions. The Planungswettbewerb under RPW 2013 judges anonymous designs through a jury with a majority of architects, pays prizes of at least the preliminary-design fee, and obliges the client to commission one of the prize-winners through a negotiated procedure without a new call. Berlin saw 200 of the first and 8 of the second in 2025.