Writing an invoice as a photographer – even without a registered business: you may, but three things need sorting afterwards

Yes, you may write an invoice even if you have not registered a business. An invoice is not an official form; it is a statement of what you delivered and what it costs. Nobody needs a permit, a qualification or a master craftsman's certificate for that. Something else matters: as soon as you photograph regularly with the intention of earning money, you must report this to the tax office – no matter how small the amounts are. For genuinely one-off jobs there is a limit of 256 euros per year, below which nothing happens. And one thing you must get right immediately: do not put VAT on the invoice as long as you do not owe any. Otherwise you have to pay the amount to the tax office anyway, even though you were never entitled to charge it.

This article provides general information and does not replace legal or tax advice. If you have doubts about your specific case, ask your tax adviser.

Table of contents

1. May I write an invoice at all without a registered business?
2. One-off payment or regular income? The 256-euro limit
3. Trade business or liberal profession – for photographers the assignment decides
4. The chamber of skilled crafts nobody thinks about
5. What has to be on the invoice – with a sample
6. VAT: do you have to or not?
7. Why some photographers charge 7 per cent – and why that is usually wrong
8. Usage rights on the invoice: the sentence that prevents disputes
9. The artists' social insurance fund: obligation, opportunity or out of reach?
10. Why your business client asks about the artists' social security levy
11. I have already taken money without an invoice – what now?
12. Special case: wedding photography
13. When it grows: the thresholds to keep an eye on

May I write an invoice at all without a registered business?

Yes. No law ties writing an invoice to a trade licence. Anyone who has delivered a service may ask for money and write down what for.

The confusion arises like this: many people think the invoice is the moment they become "official". That is not the case. You become official the moment you start photographing regularly with the intention of making a profit. Whether you write an invoice or take the money in cash changes nothing about that. The invoice does not make things worse – it only makes them visible.

Even so, there are two points where it can get stuck.

Your business client needs the invoice for their bookkeeping. They want to deduct the expense, and that requires certain details on the document. If they are missing, the invoice comes back. Which details these are is explained further below.

You must not show VAT that you do not owe. This is the expensive mistake. If you write "19 % VAT" on the invoice although you use the small business scheme or are not registered as an entrepreneur at all, you still owe that amount to the tax office. This is set out in section 14c of the German VAT Act (UStG). Your client, in turn, usually may not deduct it – so you pay without anyone benefiting. It can be corrected, but it is work and awkward towards the client.

One-off payment or regular income? The 256-euro limit

This is the question that really decides matters – not the one about the invoice.

The occasional case. You photographed your neighbour's confirmation once and received 150 euros. That is a one-off service. For such income, section 22 no. 3 of the German Income Tax Act (EStG) sets a limit: if it stays below 256 euros in the calendar year, it is not subject to income tax.

Note the word limit. This is not an allowance where only the excess counts, but a threshold:

One euro more, and the whole amount counts. You may, however, deduct the costs incurred for it – for example travel or consumables.

The regular case. You photograph several times a year for payment, advertise it, or run an Instagram page that brings in enquiries. Then it is no longer an occasional service but self-employed work. The 256 euros then do not apply. You are taxable from the first euro of profit, and you must register the activity with the tax office.

The line between the two is not a number but an overall picture: are you repeating it? Do you want to earn money with it? Do you appear publicly? Three times "yes" usually means: self-employed.

And if I keep making a loss? Then the tax office may classify the activity as a hobby. That sounds convenient but is not: losses are then not recognised, so you cannot deduct anything either. Anyone serious about photography is better off registering.

How registering a sideline works is set out in detail in Becoming self-employed part-time.

Trade business or liberal profession – for photographers the assignment decides

Now comes the point where photography is a special case. Most self-employed people are either one or the other. Photographers can be both – depending on what they photograph.

A liberal profession under section 18 (1) no. 1 EStG includes, among others, "artistic" work. The same paragraph also names a job title many people overlook: Bildberichterstatter, a photo reporter. So anyone photographing for the press and media in a reportage style expressly falls under the liberal professions.

A trade business is commissioned photography producing technically clean images to client specifications: passport photos, application portraits, product shots for a shop, property photography, and usually classic wedding and family photography as well.

What this means in practice:

Two warnings. First, the tax office decides, not you. You enter your assessment in the questionnaire and the tax office reviews it. With photographers it looks closely, because "artistic" is a narrow term: it means an original creative achievement with scope for design, not a technically good picture.

Second, there are mixed cases. Anyone photographing weddings in summer and supplying exhibitions in winter may have two activities side by side that must be recorded separately. That is the moment when a conversation with a tax adviser pays off.

The basic distinction is explained in Freelancer or trade business? The difference. How the trade registration and the questionnaire work is set out in Registering a business and the tax registration questionnaire.

The chamber of skilled crafts nobody thinks about

Almost every guide overlooks this: photography is a craft trade. In the German Crafts Code (HwO) the occupation appears in Annex B, Section 1, under number 38.

Annex B, Section 1 is titled "crafts not requiring a licence". That is the good half of the news: you need no master craftsman's certificate and no formal training to go self-employed. Until 2004 this was different – which is why the myth persists that you must be a master photographer.

The other half: section 18 HwO requires you to notify the chamber of skilled crafts without delay when you start the business, in whose district your business is located. The same applies when you stop. In practice the chamber learns of your trade registration anyway and gets in touch – it is more pleasant to act first.

Membership brings a chamber contribution. Each chamber sets the amount itself; for small earnings and in the first years there are usually reductions or exemptions. Ask your chamber directly – the amounts differ considerably by region.

Who is not affected: anyone working as a freelance artist does not run a craft trade and is not a member of the chamber.

What has to be on the invoice – with a sample

The mandatory details are listed in section 14 (4) UStG. They also apply to small businesses, with one exception: the tax rate and tax amount are omitted, and a reference to the exemption is added instead.

This has to be on it:

• your full name and address
• name and address of the client
• your tax number or VAT identification number
• the invoice date
• a sequential invoice number issued only once
• quantity and description of what you delivered
• the date of the service (for a shoot: the date or the month)
• the amount, broken down by tax rate
• the tax rate and tax amount – or the reference to the exemption

On the invoice number: it must be sequential and unique, that is all the law requires. For your first invoice a scheme such as 2026-001 is enough, then 2026-002. You must not issue a number twice or skip one to slot it in later. Deliberately do not start with 1 – an invoice numbered 1 tells every client that they are your first.

This is what a small business invoice looks like:

Jana Berger · Lindenweg 4 · 30161 Hannover
Tax number 12/345/67890

Invoice no. 2026-001
Invoice date: 12/06/2026

To: Möbelhaus Kranz GmbH, Steinstraße 8, 30159 Hannover

Item 1  Photo shoot at the shop premises on 05/06/2026,
        full day, incl. image selection and editing
        1 flat rate                              850.00 EUR

Item 2  Simple usage rights to 20 images,
        unlimited in time and territory,
        for the client's website and social media
        1 flat rate                              250.00 EUR

Total                                          1,100.00 EUR

No VAT is charged pursuant to section 19 UStG.

Payable by 26/06/2026 to the account
DE00 0000 0000 0000 0000 00

Why the usage rights get their own item here is explained in the next two sections.

And what if I do not have a tax number yet? That is the normal situation with your very first invoice. The tax number is a mandatory detail, but you do not have it until the tax office has processed your registration questionnaire. Two ways out: submit the questionnaire and wait with the invoice until the number arrives – via ELSTER this often takes only a few days. Or write the invoice straight away and supply the number as soon as you have it. For private clients this makes no difference. A business client, however, needs the complete invoice for their input tax deduction – tell them briefly and they will usually wait. Your personal tax identification number, the eleven-digit number from the Federal Central Tax Office, does not belong on the invoice.

For small amounts it gets simpler: up to 250 euros gross, the simplified invoice with fewer details is sufficient – the specifics are in Small-amount invoice up to 250 euros. And if you have to change an invoice after sending it, that does not work by overwriting but only through a cancellation or correction invoice, see Correcting an invoice.

VAT: do you have to or not?

At the start, the small business scheme under section 19 UStG almost always applies. It works if your total turnover

• did not exceed 25,000 euros in the previous calendar year and
• does not exceed 100,000 euros in the current calendar year.

One word first, because this constantly goes wrong: turnover is not profit. Turnover is everything that comes in – the sum of all invoices, without deducting your costs. If you took in 26,000 euros and spent 14,000 euros on equipment, studio and travel, your turnover is 26,000 euros and your profit is 12,000 euros. The larger figure counts for the small business threshold.

Since 2025 these sales are expressly exempt from tax – previously the wording was that the tax "is not levied". In practice it means the same: you do not put VAT on the invoice and you do not pay any. In return, however, you do not get any input tax back either. Input tax is the VAT contained in your own purchases: those subject to VAT reclaim this share from the tax office, small businesses do not. On a new camera costing 3,000 euros that is around 480 euros you will not get back. Anyone investing heavily therefore calculates whether voluntarily waiving the scheme is cheaper.

The invoice then needs a note such as: "No VAT is charged pursuant to section 19 UStG." The law does not prescribe a specific wording, but the reason must be recognisable.

What happens if I pass 100,000 euros mid-year? Then the small business scheme ends immediately. From the sale that breaks the threshold onwards, standard taxation applies – not only from the next year. This is the limit to watch when a large assignment is on the horizon.

Everything else about the small business invoice is in Writing an invoice without VAT.

Why some photographers charge 7 per cent – and why that is usually wrong

If you are subject to VAT, sooner or later you will meet colleagues who charge 7 instead of 19 per cent. The background is real, the application usually is not.

The rule: section 12 (2) no. 7 letter c UStG reduces the rate to 7 per cent for "the granting, transfer and exercise of rights arising from the Copyright Act". Photographs are protected by copyright. So, the conclusion goes, the reduced rate applies to photo assignments.

The catch: the reduced rate only applies if the transfer of rights is the principal component of your service. And with a photo assignment it usually is not.

The Münster tax court decided exactly this on 25 February 2021 for a photo studio (case no. 5 K 268/20 U,AO). The studio had charged 7 per cent on business and application portraits intended for commercial use. The court saw a single supply consisting of the studio, the photographers' work, image editing and delivery of the files. The focus – regardless of whether the client uses the images privately or commercially – lies in creating the photographs. The transfer of rights was of only subordinate importance alongside it. One point in the reasoning is particularly important in practice: the studio had charged no separate fee for the usage rights.

What follows from this for you?

• The normal case is 19 per cent. Anyone selling a shoot and delivering the images sells a photographic service, not a licence.
• It is different when the rights genuinely are the service. You sell a publisher an existing archive image for a book, or an agency licenses an existing shot. There, the use is central, not the photographing.
• When both come together, separate them cleanly. Record in writing which usage rights are granted, and show them on the invoice as a separate item with its own price – as in the sample above.

The separation on the invoice is the precondition for any split to be considered at all. It is not a guarantee, however: whether 7 per cent applies in an individual case is judged by the tax office on the basis of what you actually agreed and delivered. This question is one of the most frequent disputes between photographers and tax offices – clarify it with your tax adviser before applying the reduced rate. Anyone applying it wrongly pays the difference later.

If you use the small business scheme, none of this concerns you yet. In that case there is no tax rate on your invoice anyway.

Usage rights on the invoice: the sentence that prevents disputes

Apart from tax, there is a second and far more practical reason to put the rights on the invoice.

The copyright in your images always stays with you. It cannot be transferred – you are and remain the author (section 7 of the German Copyright Act, UrhG). What you give the client are usage rights (section 31 UrhG). And you can tailor those: by period, by territory, by type of use.

You need to keep two forms apart:

• Simple usage right: the client may use the images. You may use them as well and may also allow others to.
• Exclusive usage right: only the client may. You yourself may not – not even for your own website, unless you expressly reserved that.

If nothing is stated on the invoice, the typical dispute arises a year later: the client suddenly uses the photos for an advertising campaign, and you take the view that only the website was paid for. Who may do what then has to be derived from the assignment – and that is laborious.

One sentence on the invoice is enough:

Simple usage right to the 20 images delivered, unlimited in time and territory, for the client's own website and social media channels. Passing on to third parties and use in paid advertising are not included.

If you want it shorter, at least state: who, how long, where, for what. Note that an invoice alone is not a contract – for larger assignments this arrangement also belongs in the quote or the order confirmation that the client confirms in advance.

The artists' social insurance fund: obligation, opportunity or out of reach?

The Künstlersozialkasse (KSK) is not a health insurer of its own but a body that gives self-employed artists and publicists access to statutory social insurance – on terms similar to those of employees. Insured members pay only about half the contributions themselves; the rest is covered by a levy on clients and a federal subsidy. For self-employed people with small incomes that is a considerable difference.

Who gets in is set out in section 1 of the Artists' Social Insurance Act (KSVG). Two conditions count:

• You pursue the artistic or journalistic activity professionally and not merely temporarily.
• You employ no more than one employee (trainees and marginally employed staff do not count).

There is also a lower limit in section 3 KSVG: anyone earning no more than 3,900 euros a year from this activity is exempt from insurance – and therefore stays outside. This does not apply to newcomers: during the first three years after taking up the activity the lower limit does not bite. And anyone who later drops below it is not thrown out immediately – only if that happens more than twice within six years.

For photographers the decisive hurdle is a different one: the KSK examines whether your work is artistic or journalistic. Photojournalism, free artistic photography and creative advertising photography are regularly recognised. Purely commissioned photography without creative scope of your own – passport photos, product shots to specification – rather not. It is the same dividing line as at the tax office, but it is assessed separately: recognition by the KSK does not bind the tax office, and vice versa.

An application is still worthwhile if photography is your main occupation. The KSK provides a questionnaire for this.

Why your business client asks about the artists' social security levy

This question surprises many people on their first business assignment. It has nothing to do with you personally.

Companies that regularly commission self-employed artists or publicists must pay a levy on the fees to the artists' social insurance fund – the Künstlersozialabgabe. It falls due at the client, not at you, and it falls due even if you are not insured with the KSK at all. The percentage is set annually; the current rate is published by the KSK.

For you this means three things: you do not have to pay anything towards it. You can answer the question calmly. And you then know that this levy is an additional cost item for your client – which explains why some clients scrutinise photography fees more closely than other invoices.

I have already taken money without an invoice – what now?

This is the most common case, and it is rarely as dramatic as it feels.

What matters is whether the income was taxable at all. Two one-off shoots for 200 euros in total fall under the 256-euro limit – then there is nothing to do. If it was more, or if you photographed regularly, the income belongs in your tax return.

A route that works in practice:

1. Compile what happened. List all income for the year, with date, client and amount. Bank statements and your PayPal history help. So do the expenses – camera equipment, travel and software reduce the profit.
2. Catch up on the registration. The tax registration questionnaire is completed via ELSTER; in it you state since when you have been active. A date in the past is expressly provided for. How to obtain the tax number is described in Applying for a German tax number via ELSTER.
3. Include it in the tax return. For the current year that is usually enough. If the year has already been filed, it becomes an amendment – and at the latest here a tax adviser makes sense so that the correction is formally correct.
4. Write invoices retrospectively? For the past you do not have to, as long as your clients were private individuals. A business client who still wants to book the expense gets the invoice afterwards; it is dated with the date of the service, not today's date.

The only important thing is not to wait for the problem to solve itself. It grows with every year.

Special case: wedding photography

Weddings are the entry point for many – and the area with the most questions about invoicing.

Tax rate. Following the Münster court's reasoning, everything speaks for 19 per cent on a wedding assignment once you are subject to VAT. The service is accompanying and photographing the day, not the licence.

Deposit. For dates booked a year in advance, a deposit is customary. Bill it via a progress invoice and deduct it again in the final invoice – otherwise you end up paying the VAT twice. How that works properly is described in Writing a progress invoice.

Cancellation fee. What happens if the couple cancels four weeks beforehand? Agree this in writing beforehand. A pure cancellation fee without a service in return is treated differently for VAT purposes than a service – here too, a brief check with your tax adviser is worthwhile before you issue your first such invoice.

Usage rights. Couples today naturally want to post the images on Instagram, and the parents want prints. Write down what is allowed – ideally including the question of whether you may use the pictures for your portfolio. Without that permission you may not, because the people depicted have their own right to their image.

When it grows: the thresholds to keep an eye on

Three figures decide when a sideline turns into a business with more obligations:

There is also the bookkeeping obligation: only from 800,000 euros turnover or 80,000 euros profit a year does section 141 of the German Fiscal Code (AO) require double-entry bookkeeping with a balance sheet – and even then only once the tax office requires it of you. Until then a cash-basis income statement is enough, in which you compare income and expenses. How that works is described in Doing your tax return as a self-employed person.

For the invoices themselves you need little at the start: a continuous number sequence, the mandatory details, and a filing system in which you can find the invoices for eight years. This period has applied since 1 January 2025 and is set out in section 14b (1) UStG – many guides still say ten years. For other documents such as annual accounts and accounting records it does remain ten years under section 147 (3) AO, so keeping everything together for ten years is the simpler route. Anyone using a program mainly saves themselves thinking about the number sequence and the small business note – in Easy Invoice the tax rate can be set per item, so the shoot and the usage rights can be shown separately on one invoice. A spreadsheet will do as well, as long as you never issue a number twice.

If you remember only one point: write the invoice, but do not put VAT on it before you know that you owe any. Everything else can be sorted out later – this mistake costs money straight away.

Sources: Section 14 UStG · Section 14c UStG · Section 12 UStG · Section 19 UStG · Section 18 EStG · Section 22 EStG · Section 141 AO · Section 11 GewStG · Section 18 HwO · Annex B HwO · Section 7 UrhG · Section 31 UrhG · Section 1 KSVG · Section 3 KSVG · Künstlersozialkasse · Münster Tax Court, judgment of 25 February 2021, case no. 5 K 268/20 U,AO