Does ReceiptIQ AI support German receipts (Kassenbons)?

September 30, 2026 · ReceiptIQ AI · Xinzhou Liu

Short answer: Yes. ReceiptIQ AI reads German Kassenbons line by line: the total from SUMME, Gesamtbetrag or Zu zahlen, comma decimals, Pfand and Leergut as their own lines, discounts as negative lines, and Trinkgeld. The app itself is available in German, and German receipts are part of the set every release is checked against; the limits are listed at the end.

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What it reads on a German receipt

The total: SUMME, Gesamtbetrag, Zu zahlen

The receipt's total is taken from the keyword lines SUMME, GESAMT, GESAMTBETRAG, GESAMTSUMME, ZU ZAHLEN, ENDBETRAG, ENDSUMME and RECHNUNGSBETRAG (and SUMTE, which is what text recognition makes of a dot-matrix "Summe"). ZWISCHENSUMME is a subtotal and is never taken as the total.

A line containing NETTO ("Gesamtbetrag netto") is not the total. It is printed below the real total on many receipts.
A keyword line inside the MwSt. / USt. tax table is not the total either. On the REWE layout the last row of the tax table reads "Gesamtbetrag netto steuer brutto"; on a real restaurant receipt the USt. table ends in a row that starts with "Total" and carries three amounts. Both used to be mistaken for the total and are now skipped.
Payment lines are not the total: "Geg. BAR", "Rückgeld", "Girocard", "Kartenzahlung" and similar are left out when looking for the amount under a SUMME line.

Paying with a banknote does not change the total

A real case from a German user's report: an EDEKA receipt with Summe 6,82, paid with a 10-euro note. The app saved 10.00 as the total, the cash handed over, instead of 6.82. It was fixed the same day with a rule that is only arithmetic: cash given minus change returned is what was paid. The full story is on Receipts Around the World.

Comma decimals and euro amounts

Amounts such as 1,99, EUR 33,89 and 7,80 € are read as prices. A period counts as a thousands separator only when it sits between digits, so the period in "Geg. BAR EUR 15,00" does not turn 15,00 into 1500.

Quantity and weight lines

Lines such as 3 Stk × 1,99 5,97 or 0,47 kg x 1,49 EUR/kg belong to the item printed above them; the last amount on the line is the line total.

Pfand and Leergut

Pfand (deposit paid) and Leergut (deposit returned) are read as their own lines. Since Sep 17 2026 the app has a default Tax category for tax and fee lines, and refundable deposits are filed there (the rule matches PFAND and STATIEGELD, among other words), so a crate of water does not inflate the food budget. Leergut is a negative line in the same category. In the German app this category is called "Pfand & Steuern" (since version 2.4.4). Receipts scanned before the category existed are not re-filed. More on Pfand auf dem Kassenbon (German).

Rabatt, Aktion, Gutschein

RABATT, AKTION and GUTSCHEIN lines are read as discounts and kept as their own negative lines, for example "Lidl Plus Rabatt −0,50" or "AKTION −0,30", so the items still add up to the printed total.

MwSt. and USt.

MWST-Betrag, USt and STEUER lines are recognised as tax words, and the tax summary (A = 19 %, B = 7 %) is told apart from the total line. ReceiptIQ AI does not calculate a VAT return; it reads what is printed.

Trinkgeld

On a real restaurant receipt the Summe was 43,90, the Trinkgeld 6,10 and the Girocard payment 50,00. A separately printed tip is added to the total (43,90 + 6,10 = 50,00), the same rule as for US restaurant receipts, instead of triggering a false "does not add up" message. TRINKGELD is treated as a tip word.

An example: a rendered Lidl receipt, item by item

This is a rendered test receipt from our German test set (not a customer's receipt), the result as published on Kassenbon Scanner mit KI (German; verified on the production scanner on Sep 27 2026).

Category (German app)	Lines	Sum
Lebensmittel & Getränke	water 6x1,5l 3,18 · Lidl Plus Rabatt −0,50 · Quark 0,79 · Gouda 2,99 · Bauernbrot 1,19 · Äpfel 0,70 · Vollmilch 0,99 · Bananen 2,09	11,43 €
Pfand & Steuern	Pfand 3,00 · Leergut −0,25	2,75 €
Drogerie & Haushalt	Küchenrolle 1,49	1,49 €

11,43 + 2,75 + 1,49 = 15,67 €, the printed Summe.

The app itself is in German

German was added to the app on Sep 14 2026 and is one of 16 app languages. The German text addresses you with "Sie". Category names follow what German household books use: Lebensmittel & Getränke, Drogerie & Haushalt, Mobilität & Tanken, Freizeit & Unterhaltung, Heimwerken & Reparaturen, Pfand & Steuern, Kleidung & Shopping, Essen gehen (display names; since version 2.4.4). The euro is a home currency, and amounts are shown with a comma.

Export: one CSV row per Position

Since version 2.4.4, Settings → Your Data → Data Export has an "Export Items to CSV" button: one row per item (receipt ID, date, store, item, item category, receipt category, type, amount, and for converted receipts the printed currency, printed amount and rate). The normal CSV has one row per receipt, and there is a PDF report. All three are Premium features. See Can I export my receipt data?

How German receipts are tested

Before every release the scanner is run against a fixed set of receipts, and a release is blocked if one gets worse. The German part of that set is 40 rendered supermarket receipts (REWE, EDEKA, Lidl, ALDI SÜD, dm and Kaufland layouts), six real German receipts and one receipt rebuilt from a user's report. When the German sets were first run on Sep 14 2026, 30 of the 40 rendered and 2 of the 5 real receipts passed the gate's checks; after the fixes above, 39 of 40 and 5 of 5 did (the sixth real receipt, a Berlin restaurant, was added on Sep 21). The real German receipts in the set are restaurants and shops; the supermarket layouts are rendered replicas, because we did not have real supermarket photos. More: Receipts Around the World.

Privacy

The photo stays on your iPhone. Text recognition runs on the phone, and only the recognised text is sent to our server for the AI step; no copy of the receipt is stored there. No account, no bank connection. Details: Does ReceiptIQ AI upload my receipt photos? and the privacy policy.

Price and limits

The first 30 receipts, manual entries included, are free. Then Premium costs €1.99 per month or €17.99 per year in the German and Austrian App Store (Switzerland: CHF 2 and CHF 15). iPhone only.

A badly crumpled or faded receipt can be misread. A flat, well-lit photo helps.
A discount line is sometimes attached to the wrong item while the total is still right. Every item and category can be corrected in the app.
Handwritten receipts are hard for any text recognition; enter those by hand.
The real German receipts in our test set are restaurants and shops, not supermarkets (see above). If a supermarket receipt reads wrong, the in-app "Report a Problem" button is how we find out.

Frequently asked questions

Does ReceiptIQ AI read SUMME and Zu zahlen as the total?

Yes. SUMME, GESAMT, GESAMTBETRAG, GESAMTSUMME, ZU ZAHLEN, ENDBETRAG, ENDSUMME and RECHNUNGSBETRAG are read as total keywords. Subtotal lines (ZWISCHENSUMME), net lines and rows inside the MwSt. tax table are not taken as the total.

What does ReceiptIQ AI do with Pfand and Leergut?

Pfand and Leergut are read as their own lines and filed in the Tax category (called "Pfand & Steuern" in the German app since version 2.4.4), with Leergut as a negative line, so deposits do not inflate the food budget.

Is the ReceiptIQ AI app available in German?

Yes. German was added on Sep 14 2026 and is one of 16 app languages. Category names follow German household books, for example Lebensmittel & Getränke and Drogerie & Haushalt.

Does it handle Trinkgeld on a restaurant receipt?

Yes. A separately printed Trinkgeld is added to the Summe when the card payment shows the sum of both, for example 43,90 + 6,10 = 50,00, instead of raising a false mismatch.

Is my Kassenbon photo uploaded?

No. Text recognition runs on the iPhone and the photo stays on it. Only the recognised text is sent to our server for the AI step. The browser demo on the website is different: there the photo is sent once and not stored.