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What Germany's HU and AU inspection costs: the price lists that actually exist

Five German test centres publish their fees online. We fetched them — and name the ones that publish nothing.

Meridians Technik-Redaktion

Published 21 August 2026 · Updated 21 August 2026 · 7 min read

What Germany's HU and AU inspection costs: the price lists that actually existAutomotive
Photo: Foto von Gustavo Fring / Pexels (Pexels-Lizenz — kostenlos nutzbar, Nennung rechtlich nicht erforderlich (oben dennoch angegeben).)

The short answer

  • For a car up to 3.5 tonnes, the publicly available fees for the German roadworthiness test with emissions check ranged from 163.00 to 167.90 euros including VAT in August 2026.
  • Not every test organisation publishes prices: TÜV SÜD and TÜV NORD issue binding fee lists per federal state, while GTÜ and KÜS leave pricing to their independent stations and DEKRA lists no amounts on its customer page.
  • When the emissions check is dropped — as it is for a battery-electric car — the fee falls sharply, though by very different amounts depending on the list.
  • Miss the due month by more than two months and the StVZO requires supplementary checks; the ADAC puts the resulting surcharge at 20 percent.

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Germany requires every car to pass a periodic roadworthiness test — the Hauptuntersuchung, or HU, universally called "the TÜV" even when another organisation performs it — normally bundled with an emissions check, the Abgasuntersuchung or AU. Ask what it costs and you mostly get approximations. The ADAC's overview dated 30 July 2026 says "gut 160 Euro" for HU and AU together on a car up to 3.5 tonnes: a national average, not an invoice. So we went the other way and wrote down only what test centres publish themselves. The resulting list is shorter than expected, and that is the point.

HU with AU, car up to 3.5 tonnes: the published fees

All figures below are gross prices including 19 percent VAT and cover the inspection itself. Repairs, parts and the cost of a re-test are not included.

  • TÜV SÜD, Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg — 163.00 euros — "HU inkl. AU mit Endrohrmessung bis 3,5 t", binding fee list valid from 1 January 2026
  • KÜS station Berlin (B.E.S. Ingenieurbüro) — 164.00 euros — inspection including the emissions section, car up to 3,500 kg, fee list valid from 1 March 2026
  • GTÜ station Hanau — 165.00 euros — HU including AU under section 29 StVZO, car up to 3.5 t; the price list gives no validity date and is explicitly stated to be without guarantee
  • TÜV SÜD, North Rhine-Westphalia — 166.00 euros — car including AU, fee list valid 1 January to 31 December 2026
  • TÜV NORD, Lower Saxony — 167.90 euros — "Kraftfahrzeug bis 3,5 t" with exhaust measurement, fee list valid from 1 January 2026

Who publishes nothing — and why that is the real story

The list has five rows rather than eight because the organisations are structured differently. TÜV SÜD and TÜV NORD run their own stations and publish fee lists per federal state that a customer can read in advance. GTÜ and KÜS work largely through self-employed engineers and contract partners who set their own fees — there is no nationwide list, only the price pages of individual stations, two of which we retrieved as examples. DEKRA's customer page on the Hauptuntersuchung returned HTTP 404 on 21 August 2026, and we found no nationally published fee list. TÜV Rheinland gives no amounts on its information page about testing electric cars either. In practice: with two providers you can look the price up beforehand, with the others you have to ask.

Without the emissions check it gets cheaper — but by wildly different amounts

The emissions check has been part of the roadworthiness test since 2010, but it falls away when there is no combustion engine. TÜV Rheinland puts it plainly on its electric-car page: "Bei reinen E-Fahrzeugen entfällt die Abgasuntersuchung" — for pure electric vehicles, the emissions check is dropped. The fee lists carry a separate line for that, and the spread between them is striking.

  • TÜV SÜD, Bavaria — 63.30 euros — "Mehrspurige Kfz bis 3,5 t", inspection without AU; against 163.00 euros with exhaust measurement, a difference of 99.70 euros
  • KÜS station Berlin — 105.00 euros — inspection without the emissions section, car up to 3,500 kg; the emissions section on its own is listed at 64.00 euros
  • TÜV NORD, Lower Saxony — 110.90 euros — "Kraftfahrzeug bis 3,5 t" without exhaust measurement; against 167.90 euros with measurement, a difference of 57.00 euros

Two months late: first more testing, then more money

The reason an overdue inspection costs more is not a penalty written into the German road traffic fee schedule — its fee items 413 and 414 contain no late surcharge. The reason is scope. Annex VIIIa number 2.2 StVZO requires supplementary examinations, among other cases, "bei Überschreitungen des Vorführtermins zur HU um mehr als zwei Monate" — when the due date is exceeded by more than two months. More work, larger bill: the ADAC puts the surcharge at 20 percent in its article dated 20 May 2026. On top comes the fine. For cars, motorcycles and light trailers the ADAC lists 15 euros beyond two months, 25 euros at four to eight months, and 60 euros plus one point on the Flensburg driving record beyond eight months.

Fail the test and a hard deadline starts. Under Annex VIII number 3.1.4.3 StVZO the defects must be remedied without delay and the vehicle presented again "spätestens bis zum Ablauf von einem Monat nach dem Tag der Hauptuntersuchung" — within one month of the inspection date. Arrive later and you do not get a re-check but a fresh full inspection. Re-test fees, again, are published only by some: TÜV NORD Lower Saxony lists 24.00 euros for stage 1 and 42.00 euros for stage 2, the GTÜ station in Hanau 58.00 euros for a car, and the ADAC gives "rund 30 Euro" as an average. For new cars, Annex VIII number 2.1.2.1.1 StVZO still applies: first inspection after 36 months.

Sources

Every factual claim above is traceable to these documents. Check them — that is why they are here.

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Meridians Technik-Redaktion is an editorial desk at Meridians, not an individual. A desk byline means the article was produced and fact-checked to that desk's published standards. Read our editorial standards and corrections policy.

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