Germany company car: logbook or the 1% rule?

Logbook or the 1% rule: the difference

A company car with private use has two ways to value the taxable benefit. The 1% rule (Ein-Prozent-Regelung) adds a flat 1% of the gross list price every month, regardless of how much of the driving is actually private (§ 6(1) no. 4 sentence 2 EStG). A proper mileage logbook (Fahrtenbuch) instead uses the car's real costs and the real ratio of private to other trips (§ 8(2) sentence 4 EStG for employees, § 6(1) no. 4 sentence 3 EStG for self-employed people whose car is used more than 50% for business).

For the commute to the first place of work, the 1% rule adds a second flat rate: 0.03% of the taxable base per kilometer of distance and month (§ 8(2) sentence 3 EStG). Someone who only drives to the office on a few days can value each trip individually at 0.002% instead, a separate topic this blog covers elsewhere in more depth.

Both methods apply regardless of the drivetrain, even though electric and hybrid cars get to use a lower list price under the 1% rule. How much that changes the bill, and when a logbook is worth the extra work despite it, is what the calculations below show.

The 1% rule: simple, but blind to actual use

The 1% rule is the default method because it needs no receipts: taxable base times 1% for private use, plus 0.03% per kilometer of distance for the commute, recalculated every month (§ 6(1) no. 4 sentence 2 EStG, § 8(2) sentence 3 EStG). Running it only takes one number, the list price, which payroll enters once.

The downside sits in exactly that flat rate. It counts the list price, not the price actually paid after a discount, not the car's age, and not how many of the kilometers driven are really private. For an expensive car, a heavily discounted one, or one driven mostly for business, the flat rate can run well above the real private benefit. Every number for the 1% side comes straight from the API through the company car tax dataset.

How high the flat rate turns out for a given car also depends heavily on the drivetrain. Electric and hybrid cars don't use the full list price, as the next section shows with real numbers.

The 1% rule compared: gas, hybrid and electric

How much the 1% rule costs each month depends a lot on the drivetrain, because electric and hybrid cars only count part of the list price as the taxable base. For fully electric cars, either a quarter or half of the gross list price counts since 2019, depending on when the car was bought and how high its list price is (§ 6(1) no. 4 sentence 2 EStG).

Which price cap applies to which purchase date is listed with the company car calculator reference. For an electric car with a €45,000 list price, bought in September 2025, the calculator therefore uses only €11,200.00 as the taxable base, a quarter of the list price.

For externally chargeable hybrids, the halving additionally depends on CO2 emissions or the minimum electric range, for cars bought between 2019 and 2030. For a hybrid with a €45,000 list price, bought in June 2024 with at most 40 grams of CO2 per kilometer, that is €22,500.00, half the list price. Leave out both the CO2 figure and the range, and the API calculates without the halving: €720.00 a month in taxable benefit, the same as a comparable gas car.

Taxable benefit compared: gas, hybrid and electric

Source: Values from the company car calculator of the API for October 2026, a 20 km commute in every row; basis: § 6(1) no. 4 sentence 2 and § 8(2) sentence 3 EStG

The mileage logbook: fair to actual use, strict to keep

A proper logbook (ordnungsgemäßes Fahrtenbuch) replaces the flat rate with only the share of the car's real costs that falls on private trips: "The value of private use is set at the expenses attributable to private use, if the total expenses arising from the vehicle are proven by receipts and the ratio of private trips to other trips is proven by a proper logbook" (§ 8(2) sentence 4 EStG). Self-employed people with a car used mostly for business get nearly the same wording through § 6(1) no. 4 sentence 3 EStG.

A self-chosen example to illustrate the formula, not an average and not a typical case: say a car costs €9,000 in total over a year, and 20% of the kilometers driven are private. That is €1,800 a year, or €150 a month, as the taxable benefit for private use. For comparison, a similar gas car with a €45,000 list price adds €450.00 a month for private use alone under the 1% rule, before the commute.

Quellenkontor's company car calculator only computes this 1% side, not the logbook method. That's because a logbook needs the car's actual annual costs and the real private share of the kilometers driven, both individual figures from receipts and records, not statutory values an API could look up. What a calculator can and can't cover is explained on the page about calculators and their limits.

A proper mileage logbook: what belongs in it

• Kept promptly and in closed form: bound, or at least self-contained enough that later insertions are excluded or clearly recognizable as such. Loose notes don't qualify (R 8.1(9) no. 2 of the wage tax guidelines, LStR; Federal Fiscal Court, judgment of March 1, 2012, VI R 33/10).
• For every business trip: date and odometer reading at the start and end, destination and, for detours, the route, purpose of the trip and the business partner visited (R 8.1(9) no. 2 LStR).
• For private trips, the kilometers driven are enough. No reason is required.
• For trips between home and the first place of work, a short note in the logbook is enough.
• Electronic logbooks only count if later changes to data already entered are technically excluded, or at least documented and disclosed within the file itself. A freely editable spreadsheet doesn't qualify (Federal Fiscal Court, order of January 12, 2024, VI B 37/23).
• Kept without gaps for the whole calendar year, not just a representative stretch, or the tax office won't accept it.

Switching between the logbook and the 1% rule

Switching methods mid-year isn't possible for the same car. Once you've settled on the 1% rule or the logbook for a year, you stay with it for that car and that year, because the logbook method only applies if the logbook is kept for the entire period (Federal Fiscal Court, judgment of March 20, 2014, VI R 35/12).

That doesn't apply when the car itself changes during the year. For a new car, the method can be chosen again, independent of what applied to the old one. If you're unsure whether a logbook is worth the effort, a change of car or a new calendar year is a natural point to try it.

Businesses with several cars can also choose the method separately for each one: a logbook for the car driven mostly for business, the 1% rule for a second car that's rarely used privately.

Logbook despite the 1% rule: a decision guide

• Mostly business driving, little private use: a logbook usually pays off, because the flat rate assumes a much higher private share than is actually driven.
• An expensive car, or one bought at a steep discount: the 1% rule is based on the list price, not the price actually paid, which often makes it costlier than a logbook in these cases.
• Little time, or drivers who change often: without complete, prompt records, the tax office won't accept the logbook, and the 1% rule usually stays the safer choice.
• An electric or hybrid car with a low list price: after the reduction, the 1% rule is often already cheap enough that a logbook barely pays for the effort.
• Not sure which is cheaper: calculate both sides first, the 1% side with real numbers from the API, the logbook with your own estimate of annual costs and the private share of kilometers driven.

Checking the 1% side through the API

Comparing both methods means having reliable numbers for the 1% side for every drivetrain, not just a gas car. The dienstwagen calculator returns the taxable base, private use, commute and taxable benefit in one response, using the same listenpreis, antrieb, anschaffung and entfernung_km parameters for all three drivetrains.

A call for the electric example from the table above looks like this, with antrieb=elektro and the purchase date, which is required for electric and hybrid cars:

On the MCP server, the same tool is called hr_dienstwagen, with the same parameters as the REST API. Every tool and its parameters are listed on the page for all MCP tools.

With a free key, you can run both sides for your own vehicle: sign up for free.

Request with curl: electric, €45,000 list price

curl "https://api.quellenkontor.dev/v1/hr/dienstwagen?listenpreis=45000&antrieb=elektro&anschaffung=2025-09-01&entfernung_km=20&datum=2026-10-01" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $QK_KEY"

Excerpt of the response

{
  "datensatz": "dienstwagen",
  "antrieb": "elektro",
  "minderung": { "id": "elektro_viertel_bis_100000", "anteil_listenpreis": 0.25 },
  "bemessungsgrundlage": 11200,
  "privatnutzung_monat": 112,
  "fahrten_wohnung_monat": 67.2,
  "geldwerter_vorteil_monat": 179.2
}

All three drivetrains with the Python SDK

import os
from quellenkontor import Quellenkontor

qk = Quellenkontor(api_key=os.environ["QK_KEY"])
FAHRZEUGE = [
    {"antrieb": "verbrenner"},
    {"antrieb": "hybrid", "anschaffung": "2024-06-01", "co2_g_km": 40},
    {"antrieb": "elektro", "anschaffung": "2025-09-01"},
]
for fahrzeug in FAHRZEUGE:
    r = qk.hr.dienstwagen(listenpreis=45000, entfernung_km=20, datum="2026-10-01", **fahrzeug)
    print(fahrzeug["antrieb"], r["bemessungsgrundlage"], r["geldwerter_vorteil_monat"])

# verbrenner 45000 720
# hybrid 22500 360
# elektro 11200 179.2