8 DAYS AGO • 7 MIN READ

What will change in 2025 for expats in Germany?

profile

GermanPedia

Learn something new about Germany every day. We cover every aspect of life in Germany: insurance, tax, real estate, schooling, scams, etc.

Changes in 2025 summarized

Health

  • Private and public health insurance will get expensive in 2025. Public insurance will get more expensive than private for high earners.
  • From January 2025, electronic patient records (ePA) will be gradually introduced for everyone. ePA is a digital folder for your health-related data.
  • Long-term nursing care insurance premiums will increase by 0.2% in 2025. At the same time, nursing care benefits will increase by 4.5%.

Insurance

Utility & petrol costs

  • The CO2 price will rise from €45 per ton to €55 per ton in 2025. This will make petrol 2.8 ct/l more expensive and diesel 3.2 ct/l more expensive.
  • Gas prices will increase in 2025 due to higher network fees and an increase in CO2 prices.

Social Security and tax

Banking and investment

  • We find C24* the best bank to offer free checking accounts. However, it offers apps and services only in German.
  • Start investing in ETFs that track broad market indices. In Germany, you pay capital gains tax on 70% of the profits from equity ETFs. 30% of the profit from equity ETFs remains tax-free. You can open a free depot account with Scalable Capital* and Finanzen.net Zero*.
  • Earn interest on your cash. Consorsbank* offers the highest savings interest rate of 3.55% on daily bank accounts (Tagesgeldkonto).
  • We find FYRST* the best bank to offer free business accounts.

Politics

  • Prepare for an election in February 2025. Five Bürgerämter (citizens’ services offices) in Berlin will be closed to prepare for February’s national elections.
  • Fireworks may only be legally used from 6 pm Dec. 31 until 7 am Jan. 1.
  • There will be a shortage of 26000 primary school teachers in 2025.

German visas and skilled workers

  • You can apply for a skilled workers visa online from 1 Jan 2025.
  • Hopefully, one can apply for a student and family reunification visa online in 2025.
  • Every year, the German economy is short 400,000 skilled workers.

Impact on your net salary due to increased social security contributions

Prepare for receiving a lower net salary in 2025. Suppose you earned and are earning 8000 € gross per month in 2024 and 2025. The table below shows the impact on your net income in 2025.

If you are an employee, your employer will contribute around 50% to your social security contributions. This means you’ll get 89.4 € (178.8/2) less every month in 2025. It amounts to 1072.8 € of lost income in 2025.

You can read the complete guide here.


Community Shoutouts!

Thanks for sharing your feedback on our different products and guides. We have updated them based on your suggestions.

  • Guide on "Capital gains tax" - Updated the guide to clarify the following topics: "Advanced tax", "Tax on ETFs", and "Tax on futures and options."
  • Citizenship test questions - Corrected the name of the current German chancellor and current head of state. We will also provide a PDF containing all the questions and answers for people joining the free citizenship test course.

Thanks again for your constructive feedback. We look forward to your suggestions and strive to improve continuously.

Would you like to share a story or a must-visit place? Click the button below and share it with the community.

Whether it's a must-visit place, a life hack, or an inspiring story, we’d love to hear from you.


Your feedback matters

New on GermanPedia

German citizenship by marriage

Learn the process of applying for German citizenship by marriage. What are the eligibility criteria and documents required to apply for German citizenship?

Public health insurance additional contributions in 2025

Public health insurance companies have more than doubled their additional contribution amount in 2025. You can check which health insurer increased it and by how much in our guide.

Stop paying high health insurance premiums

95% of the services offered by all public health insurance companies are the same. The reason is that the government regulates health insurers and ensures they provide the same coverage.

This is why locals switch to a public insurance company that charges lower premiums.

You can compare the premium you pay with your current public insurer and potential savings here.

Expats guide to buying a house in Germany

German healthcare demystified

German healthcare demystified for students

Deals for you

Ask an expert

Important types of insurance you should have in Germany

Personal Finance

NOTE: Investing involves the risk of loss

Fixed account for 12 months (Festgeld)

  • Up to 3.56% interest.
  • Check offers from different providers here*.

Tagesgeld account for 6 months

  • Up to 3.77% interest.
  • Check offers from different providers here*.

Personal loan

Disclaimer

The information provided here is based on our own experience and in-depth research. The content might be inaccurate. It should not be considered financial, insurance, tax, legal, or any kind of advice.

We are not certified brokers or consultants. Always do your research and contact certified professionals before making any decision.

We finance our extensive work via affiliate links. Thus, some or all of the links in the post might be affiliate links.

We get money if you click on such a link or conclude a contract with the provider without costing you a cent extra.

Investment involves risk of losing money.

All links marked with the "*" are affiliate links.

GermanPedia

Learn something new about Germany every day. We cover every aspect of life in Germany: insurance, tax, real estate, schooling, scams, etc.