Comparison · 10 tools · Updated August 2026
The best B2B database for Germany depends on what you are looking for
By Benedict Mehlmann, technology and product at Kodo Leads · Last updated
Kodo comes as software (from €290 a month) and as a full service (from €1,790).
Company profile, credit standing, financials and contacts come from four different sources. No vendor leads on all four. This page says who leads where, and names the free official source too.
Kodo Leads is our own product. It is listed in the same grid as everyone else, with its weaknesses named. The free official sources are deliberately included, because for some use cases they are the right answer.
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The short answer
- You need company profile, legal form and financials on German firms for sales.DealfrontGrown out of Echobot in Karlsruhe, it reads the official registers and wraps a sales-usable interface around them.
- You need credit standing, payment experience and risk assessment.CreditreformThat has been their core business for over a hundred years. No sales tool comes close to that depth, and none should be used for a credit decision.
- You want to look up a single company and pay nothing for it.Unternehmensregister or North DataThe official source is publicly accessible. North Data presents it more readably. For one-off lookups you need no contract.
- You need mobile numbers for cold calling across Europe.CognismNone of the German company databases is built for that. Conversely Cognism is shallow on German company data. These are two separate purchases.
Every tool side by side.
Measured against one concrete question instead of database sizes: take a German mid-sized company with around 180 employees, no active online self-presentation and no LinkedIn-active management. Which vendor knows its legal form, register number, last annual accounts and one reachable contact? That company is the norm in German B2B, not the exception.
| Provider | German companies | Register & financials | Source per statement | Strong at |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dealfront | strong | yes | partly | German register data at a depth no international vendor reaches, plus website visitors |
| Creditreform | strong | yes | yes | Credit standing and payment experience, data points available nowhere else, plus near-complete coverage |
| Implisense | strong | no | partly | Register data and register signals, API |
| Dun & Bradstreet | medium | no | partly | Global coverage, group structures, risk |
| Kodo Leadsour product | strong | yes | yes | The reason to call, not just the number: a new plant, an open production role, a fresh certification. With a date and a link to the source, even when the news only ever appeared on the company website. |
| North Data | strong | yes | yes | Official sources cleanly presented, free single lookups, ownership links at a glance |
| Unternehmensregister and Bundesanzeiger | strong | yes | yes | The primary source, free to inspect, legally authoritative |
| Cognism | medium | no | partly | Mobile numbers at a quality hard to beat in the European market |
| ZoomInfo | weak | no | no | Coverage and depth in the US market, broad tooling ecosystem |
| Apollo.io | weak | no | no | Prices published, free tier, database and sequences in one product |
Each tool in detail
-
Dealfront
Formed in 2023 from Echobot in Karlsruhe and Leadfeeder in Finland. German company data from the commercial register and federal gazette, combined with website visitor identification. The most obvious starting point for selling into the German mid-market.
- Strong at
- German register data at a depth no international vendor reaches, plus website visitors
- Where it stops
- Mobile numbers weaker than Cognism, thin outside DACH, price on request only
Suitable for: Sales teams targeting German and Austrian companies who need legal form, register and ownership alongside addresses.
Detailed comparison -
Creditreform
The cooperative credit agency network, founded in 1879. By far the most complete record of German companies, because it is fed not only by registers but also by payment experiences reported by members. Also sells marketing address lists.
- Strong at
- Credit standing and payment experience, data points available nowhere else, plus near-complete coverage
- Where it stops
- No sales interface, billed per report or through membership, no buying signals
Suitable for: Anyone making a credit decision, setting a limit or assessing their own default risk. Oversized for pure sales prospecting.
Detailed comparison -
Implisense
Register-based company database for Germany with management, financials, size class and event signals from the register and job postings; by its own account around 2.3 million companies, API available. Strong on master data and register events, without technical manufacturing attributes from the website.
- Strong at
- Register data and register signals, API
- Where it stops
- No technical attributes, Germany only
Suitable for: Sales and research teams with a Germany focus.
Detailed comparison -
Dun & Bradstreet
Global company data with D-U-N-S number, corporate hierarchies and risk rating; in the DACH region since 2021 together with the former Bisnode. Its strength lies in international group structures and compliance, less in depth for the German Mittelstand, and technical attributes or website signals are not part of the offer.
- Strong at
- Global coverage, group structures, risk
- Where it stops
- Enterprise orientation, less depth in the Mittelstand
Suitable for: Corporations and international sales organisations with compliance and risk requirements.
Detailed comparison -
Kodo Leads
Our productOur own product. Not a database you filter yourself, but a finished list: 30 to 200 companies that fit you, each with a contact person, a phone number and one sentence on why this particular firm is worth a call right now. For every company we read the website, the imprint, the job ads, the commercial register and the news, and every statement carries the link it came from.
- Strong at
- The reason to call, not just the number: a new plant, an open production role, a fresh certification. With a date and a link to the source, even when the news only ever appeared on the company website.
- Where it stops
- No CRM, no email sending. Deliberately small lists instead of millions of records, and coverage thins out beyond Germany, Austria and Switzerland.
Suitable for: Industrial mid-market sales teams that do not need another address list, but twenty companies where the call is actually worth making.
Look at Kodo Leads -
North Data
Presents publications from the commercial register and federal gazette readably, including ownership graphs and financial trends. Single lookups are free, exports and APIs are paid.
- Strong at
- Official sources cleanly presented, free single lookups, ownership links at a glance
- Where it stops
- No contacts, no email addresses, no buying signals, not designed as a sales tool
Suitable for: Anyone looking up a specific company, tracing shareholdings or viewing a financial trend without signing an annual contract.
Detailed comparison -
Unternehmensregister and Bundesanzeiger
The official source itself. Annual accounts, register entries and official notices in the original. Everything the commercial vendors know about German companies ultimately comes from here.
- Strong at
- The primary source, free to inspect, legally authoritative
- Where it stops
- Cumbersome search, no bulk export, no contacts, no address data in the sales sense
Suitable for: Anyone verifying a single statement against the original, or researching few companies without wanting to buy a tool.
Detailed comparison -
Cognism
UK provider focused on contact data for direct dialling. Part of its mobile numbers are verified by phone, plus screening against do-not-call registers in several countries.
- Strong at
- Mobile numbers at a quality hard to beat in the European market
- Where it stops
- German company data shallow, no register and no financials, annual contract with per-seat fee
Suitable for: Teams who call a lot and whose bottleneck is reachability, not company knowledge.
Detailed comparison -
ZoomInfo
The American incumbent. Very large database, very strong in the US, with intent data and attached sales tooling.
- Strong at
- Coverage and depth in the US market, broad tooling ecosystem
- Where it stops
- The German mid-market is a known weak spot, high entry cost, processing outside the EU
Suitable for: Companies with meaningful US business and a budget that carries an enterprise licence.
Detailed comparison -
Apollo.io
Large contact database plus outreach tool in one, with a published price list and a free entry tier. The cheapest serious way into this category.
- Strong at
- Prices published, free tier, database and sequences in one product
- Where it stops
- Variable data quality in Europe, very shallow German company data, credit allowances are the real price
Suitable for: Small teams and founders who want to start today and have no budget for an annual contract.
Detailed comparison
Why there is no single German B2B database
Anyone searching for a B2B database for Germany is usually searching for four different things at once: the company profile, the financial figures, the credit standing and a human being to call. Those four come from four different sources, and they are maintained by four different kinds of vendor.
Profile and figures come from the official registers. Credit standing comes from the credit agencies, which additionally evaluate payment experiences reported by their members. Contacts come from an entirely different world: professional networks, imprints and pattern inference. And the buying trigger comes from none of those, but from what a company is publishing about itself right now.
A vendor leading on all four would have to run four separate data operations at once. That vendor does not exist. So the right question is not which database is best, but which of the four is your bottleneck.
The trap with international vendors
American vendors build their records around people. That works well in markets where nearly every decision maker maintains a professional profile. In Germany it works reasonably for corporates, consultancies and technology firms, and considerably worse for the classic mid-market.
Take a supplier with 180 employees in East Westphalia. Management has been in post for twenty years and is active in no network. The website has nine pages. In a people-first database this company exists as a thin entry with a generic address. In the official registers it exists completely: legal form, register number, shareholders, annual accounts, shareholdings.
That is why a German vendor wins in Germany despite being the smaller one globally. It is not a difference in craft, it is a difference in source.
What you get for free before buying anything
Before signing an annual contract, look at the free routes. The Unternehmensregister and the Bundesanzeiger are publicly accessible. North Data presents the same publications more readably and answers single lookups without a contract.
If you research twenty companies a month, you need no tool. If you need two thousand, you do, and then it is about export, APIs and refresh. The break point is volume, not data quality.
The point no database covers
Every vendor listed here answers: which companies match my criteria. Industry, size, region, legal form, credit standing. That question matters, and it is well answered.
The question that actually decides whether you get the meeting is a different one: why should this company talk to me right now. That answer is in no master-data record, because it is not master data. It sits on the company's news page, in a freshly posted job ad, in an official notice, in a new certification, in an investment reported by the local paper.
Anyone holding a list of two thousand matching companies and still getting no meetings does not have a database problem. They have a trigger problem, and that takes a different kind of tool.
Torn between the two market leaders? The head-to-head Cognism vs. Dealfront answers exactly that choice. If official registry data is all you need, NorthData vs. Creditreform points to the free source.
Frequently asked questions
Which B2B database is best for Germany?
It depends what you need. For company profile, legal form and financials, Dealfront leads in the German market. For credit standing it is Creditreform. For mobile numbers to call, it is Cognism. International vendors such as Apollo or ZoomInfo systematically under-represent the German mid-market, because they build their records around people rather than registers.
How many companies are there in Germany?
Around 3.4 million active companies, of which roughly 400,000 sit in the classic mid-market with 10 to 499 employees. Those 400,000 are the heart of the German economy and at the same time the weakest spot of international databases.
Is the commercial register free to use?
Yes. Basic data is publicly viewable through unternehmensregister.de and handelsregister.de, as are the annual accounts published in the federal gazette. It only costs money for structured access, meaning bulk queries and APIs.
May I use B2B data for cold outreach?
Company data from public sources may be used for B2B outreach. For cold calls to businesses, however, German law (section 7 UWG) requires presumed consent, and personal data of natural persons is additionally subject to the GDPR. Clarify your specific case with your legal team, this page is not legal advice.
How current does B2B data need to be?
For master data such as address or legal form, an annual snapshot is fine, those rarely change. For buying signals, currency matters in weeks: an investment, a tender or a new role is no longer an opportunity six months later. That is the point where an annually refreshed database stops being enough.
Similar lists
B2B lead scrapers for Germany: eleven tools, honestly sorted The Best B2B Lead Generation Tools for the DACH Region The Best Sales Intelligence Platforms in Comparison Kodo vs. Apollo Kodo vs. Dealfront All resources
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