14.07.2026
5 minute read
Big news for anyone who invoices across borders or deals with government-mandated e-invoicing: Invoiless now generates compliant e-invoices in XRechnung & ZUGFeRD 🇩🇪, Factur-X 🇫🇷, and Peppol BIS 🌍 formats. Whichever standard your customers or your country require, you're covered—no extra tools needed. Let's dive in! 🚀
What is Structured E-Invoicing? 🤔
You might be thinking: "I already send my invoices as PDFs—isn't that an e-invoice?"
Not quite! A regular PDF is just a picture of an invoice. It looks great to humans, but a computer can't reliably read the amounts, tax rates, or line items from it. Someone (or some error-prone software) still has to type all that data into an accounting system on the other end.
A structured e-invoice is different. It contains all of your invoice data—seller details, line items, taxes, totals, payment terms—in a machine-readable XML format. That means:
- No manual data entry: Your customer's accounting software imports the invoice automatically.
- Fewer errors: No typos, no misread numbers, no missing tax rates.
- Faster processing: Invoices get approved and paid quicker. 💸
- Legal compliance: More and more countries now require structured e-invoices, especially for public sector work.
One Standard, Three Formats: EN 16931 🇪🇺
Here's the good news: all three formats are built on the same European standard, EN 16931. It defines exactly which data an electronic invoice must contain and how it should be structured.
Think of EN 16931 as the common language, and XRechnung, Factur-X, and Peppol BIS as three different "accents" of it. The underlying invoice data is the same—what changes is the packaging and the specific rules layered on top.
Meet the Formats: XRechnung, Factur-X, and Peppol BIS
Different regions and rules call for different invoice formats. Here's a quick rundown of the three that Invoiless now supports:
XRechnung & ZUGFeRD 🇩🇪
XRechnung is Germany's national e-invoicing standard. It's mandatory for invoicing the German public sector and plays a central role in Germany's broader B2B e-invoicing rules. It also requires a few Germany-specific details (like a buyer reference ID for government invoices).
In Invoiless, your XRechnung invoices are exported using the German ZUGFeRD format: a hybrid PDF/A-3 file with the XRechnung-compliant XML embedded inside. That means your customer gets a single file that works for everyone—a normal, human-readable PDF invoice on the outside, and machine-readable structured data on the inside that their software can process automatically.
Factur-X 🇫🇷
Factur-X is the French hybrid PDF/A-3 format with embedded XML—it's the French equivalent of ZUGFeRD and uses the exact same format under the hood. Just like its German counterpart, it combines a human-readable PDF with machine-readable XML data in one file, making it readable by both people and machines.
Why does the hybrid approach matter? Because not every client has software that can read XML e-invoices. With a hybrid file, it just doesn't matter: clients with accounting software get the structured data imported automatically, and clients without it simply open the PDF like any regular invoice. One file works for everyone. 🙌
Peppol BIS 🌍
Peppol BIS is the format used for sending invoices across the Peppol network—the most widely adopted setup for cross-border e-invoicing. It's a pure XML document (based on UBL, the Universal Business Language) and the standard of choice across much of Europe and increasingly worldwide. If your customer asks for a "Peppol invoice" or a UBL file, this is the one.
How It Works in Invoiless ⚡️
The best part? You choose the standard per customer, so every client receives invoices in the format that works for them. Setting it up takes just two steps:
Step 1: Enable e-invoicing for your business
- Go to "Settings > Integrations > Compliance".
- Find the E-invoicing (EN 16931) card and click "Enable e-invoicing".
- A dialog will open with a Compliance status section. Review the Business profile area—if any required fields are missing (such as Tax ID or bank details), follow the guide there to complete them.
- Once all required business information is complete, click "Enable e-invoicing" to finish the setup.
Step 2: Choose the standard for each customer
- Go to the "Customers" page, select a customer, and click Edit.
- Scroll to the E-invoicing section.
- Open the E-invoicing standard field and pick the format for that customer: XRechnung (Germany), Factur-X (France), or Peppol BIS (other EU).
- Fill in any additional required details, such as reference, Tax ID, and full address information (city, postal code, country, etc.).
- Click "Save changes".
That's it! From now on, every invoice—and credit note—you issue to that customer is generated in their compliant format automatically. You can change a customer's standard anytime, and customers without a standard selected will simply continue receiving regular PDF invoices as usual.
📘 Refer to this documentation for more details.
What's Next? 🔮
Generating compliant e-invoices is step one. But what about delivering them directly to your customers through the Peppol network? 👀
We're working on something exciting on that front—stay tuned for a separate announcement very soon!
Wrap Up
E-invoicing isn't just a nice-to-have anymore—it's quickly becoming the standard way businesses and governments exchange invoices. With support for XRechnung & ZUGFeRD, Factur-X, and Peppol BIS, Invoiless makes it easier than ever to generate compliant e-invoices for whoever you're billing—on a per-customer basis, with zero extra tools.
The best part? You get all this power while keeping the simple, stress-free experience Invoiless is known for. Ready to create your first compliant e-invoice? Give it a try and experience the future of invoicing today! 🧡
Happy e-invoicing! 🎉
